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fallen_raidou ([info]fallen_raidou) wrote in [info]fallen_leaves,
@ 2008-02-03 07:53:00

Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend!  Next Entry
Current mood:tired
Entry tags:genma, raidou

Waking Up is Hard to Do. [Closed to Genma & Raidou]
Backstory, set in May.

Raidou's new apartment was on the small side, but the last occupant had been considerate enough to leave it clean and tidy except for the sadly wilting plant on the windowsill. Raidou regarded the small fern for a moment and wondered what had happened to its previous owner. There really weren't many options, people left ANBU one of three ways; by their own free will, by psych finally deciding they were unable to do the job, or wrapped up in a body bag. If they were lucky enough to be in a decently sized piece. If they were lucky enough not to be flash-fried on the spot by teammates in a hurry.

There were a lot of unmarked grave sites in the world. But that was why they carved your name on the rock, if only because it gave the survivors a place to mourn.

Raidou shook his head free of morbid thoughts and watered the little plant in an act of charity before he unpacked his few boxes. It was late in the afternoon already and by the time he was done -- and had arranged everything to his precise satisfaction -- the sun was a burning piece of orange in a fiery looking sky and well on its way to kissing the horizon.

Nice to have a window.

Raidou opened it and leaned on the sill for a while, watching the sunset and feeling the slip of air brush over his bare arms. His dog tags swung free on their chain and clinked gently. "Not bad," he told the little plant, and carefully pinched off a yellow leaf. Raidou dropped the little bit of flora out of the window and tracked its spiraling journey as the breeze carried it away. By the time it touched the ground and was lost to sight, the sun had set, leaving behind a warm, clear night and a starry looking sky. "Definitely not bad," said Raidou with a slight smile.

He cooked, learning his way around his new kitchen set up, watched a movie on his somewhat battered television as he did his evening work out -- nothing particularly heavy, but enough to ease the last bit of tension from his muscles -- and wandered down the hallway to find the nearest showers and wash up. It was some time before midnight before he finally fell into his new bed and surrendered to sleep.

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 08:15 am UTC (link)
The smell was overpowering. Mildew and stagnant water and the ammonia-stench of decomposing urine. Blood and vomit and feces. Rotting vegetation. And most of all fear. The place stank of fear. Of pain and sweat and death. It was a smell that you never forgot. A smell that seared itself into your brain, so that even a faint whiff took you right back to that place, dark and cold and terrifying. It was that smell that told you where you were. That told Genma he was back there. Again.

He opened his eyes, but it was too dark to see anything. He was being swallowed up in darkness, bound by manacled wrists and ankles, hanging in a contorted twist with his feet in the air, his neck bent, his face pressed against that foul-smelling damp floor of rough, aging concrete. He knew what was coming next. The swish of something moving through the air, and the searing impact of a length of steel pipe, heated just shy of glowing, slammed against the soles of his bare feet. It jarred him into the floor, wrenching his neck and shoulders, pulling a scream from him straight into the ground.

There was laughter, rough and pitiless, and words exchanged in a language Genma didn't understand, and the swish of the pipe again, slamming into his shins this time. And again. Against his hips, against his naked genitals. He screamed and screamed and screamed, and the screaming didn't help, but he couldn't stop it. Not until his voice gave out completely, and even then he screamed, raw, nearly silent rasps of air over a throat abraded sore.

Then that woman was there--the medic--healing the burns and broken bones, touching him with a gentleness that was almost as sickening as the violence had been. Talking to him low and quick, in a language Genma couldn't understand. And then in a heavily accented voice telling him to just answer the questions this time. Please answer them, and then they'd stop.

He couldn't answer them. He'd never answer them. He'd never do that, because that was the one thing he was sure of anymore. That no matter what happened, he wouldn't answer them.

They left him alone then, in the dark, that soul-consuming dark. And in the darkness, Genma cried.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 08:19 am UTC (link)
Raidou woke up in the early hours of the morning to discover he had a noisy neighbour. He scowled, rolled over, and pulled the covers up over his head to drown out the sound of someone apparently getting a happy ending to a late night. He dozed off again and woke up with a start to a noise that definitely had nothing to do with sex.

Or not any kind of sex Raidou wanted to know about anyway.

Someone was crying. He could hear the broken rush of choked sobs through the thin wall at his back. Raidou frowned, lifting his head off the pillow. It was the kind of crying he never experienced himself; worn and weary and clearly something that had been going on for a while. It stuttered out every so often, replaced by a groan or a whimper and the stifled sound of thrashing.

A nightmare? Or something worse.

Raidou sighed softly in the dark and threw his covers off, setting down bare feet on the floor. The carpet felt slightly different in this room, a little rougher. "I'm going to get my head bitten off for this, I just know it," he told the plant on his sill, and let himself quietly out of his apartment. The walk down the hall was made in silence except for the hushed padding of his feet on scratchy carpet, and the softer sound guiding him. Raidou stopped in front of his neighbour's door and listened.

Definitely crying.

Raidou rapped his knuckles on the wood, "Yo, buddy, you okay in there?"

He'd give it ten seconds for an answer, then he was breaking in.

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 08:22 am UTC (link)
They came for him again eventually. They always did. They came pounding on the doors like they were taiko drums, shouting at the prisoners. "Up, up, get up! Move it!" And then the blinding light was there, searing Genma's eyes, just as oppressive as the darkness had been. They came with their meaty hands and hidden faces, kicking when he didn't move fast enough, laughing when his bruised, aching, fractured feet wouldn't hold his weight. They laughed and made him crawl on hands and knees over a floor with a narrow furrow down the middle, wet with a dark, blood-colored effluvia that made Genma gag.

They force fed him. They had to, because they wanted him alive, and Genma took courage from that. They wanted him alive, so they still thought he was the one they needed answers from. Maybe Seijuro was still alive. Maybe he'd escaped. Maybe someone would come and get him out of here before he broke or died. And he wasn't going to break. Never break. That's what that mask he'd worn meant, what that red swirl inked onto his shoulder meant. What being a ninja of the Leaf meant.

The masked woman was back. The woman with the syrupy drawl who sounded like she'd grown up down the street from Genma, not somewhere far to the north. She was back, and she was asking again, who had given them the plans to the power station? What were the timing codes? Where were the stolen documents? What was the password?

When Genma didn't answer, the woman hit him. She used a heavy little metal club--lead maybe--that cracked against his cheek and rattled his teeth together. Genma bit his tongue, and tried to let the taste of his own blood remind him to be strong. The club came in again, against his side this time. He could feel ribs breaking, could feel himself breaking.

Just answer them, this time, and then they will stop, in that pleading, desperate voice with the strange, clipped accent.

He wouldn't answer. Couldn't answer. It was so ironic. The things they wanted to know, Genma had no way of telling them. Kobo had known the codes, and Kobo was dead, his head sliced off right in front of Genma's eyes. She hit him again, a sharp, violent blow charged with chakra against his lower back, and this time Genma felt the wet pop of something deep inside breaking; for just a moment, his scream sounded like laughter.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 08:26 am UTC (link)
The scream that broke the night air decided Raidou before he'd finished counting ten steady heartbeats. Either someone was breaking or someone was dying, and damn if he was going to sit around and do nothing about it. He ran back to his apartment and grabbed his lockpicks from the weapons chest before dashing back. They were the standard kit issued by the quartermaster that every ANBU received when he took the scarlet tattoo and joined the ranks. Raidou's were newer then most, having been recently replaced after a mission that had lost him half his armour and gained him a few new scars.

It didn't take a whole lot of effort to break through the door. A few seals flashed and flared warningly before Raidou canceled them with a well applied jutsu, and then it was simply a matter of picking the lock and hoping a scythe blade didn't fall and end his day the terminal way.

Raidou didn't spare the time to wonder how much trouble he was going to get in for breaking into a fellow agent's apartment, he simply shoved the lockpicks into the back pocket of the loose slacks he'd been sleeping in, and opened the door with a gentle click. The room was larger then his, shadowed except for the sliver of moonlight slanting across the floor and the gentle glow cast by what could only be a nightlight. Filled with the sound of choked breathing, it smelled of fear and sweat.

Raidou found the light switch -- it was in the same place as his -- and flipped it on, almost blinding himself. He jerked a hand up to shade his eyes and took in the scene with a glance. There was no ax-murder taking place, and no ugly quarrel between lovers that had spun into something worse, there was just a man on a double bed breaking into his pillow.

It was Genma.

Raidou blinked and stutter-stepped, almost tripping over in his surprise. He hadn't seen Genma since their mission-cum-heart-to-heart almost a week back -- there was nothing unusual about that, often two agents could run a mission that tested them both to the limit, and then simply go back to what passed for a life in ANBU -- and Raidou certainly hadn't expected to run into him like this.

Another wretched noise spurred Raidou back into action, and he crossed the room in three easy strides, drawing level with the bed. Genma was twisted around himself, tangled up in a mess of sheets and a whole lot of misery. His hands were held close and his legs thrown out, feet jerking as he shifted in his sleep. His face was streaked with sweat and tears, half buried in his pillow and contorted by whatever nightmare he was living through.

Raidou hesitated -- this was a very good way to get himself killed -- and then dropped his hand carefully on Genma's bare shoulder. He could feel the hard uneven line of a notched collarbone and the swell of muscle tensing under his fingers. Raidou squeezed gently, bracing himself to dodge. "Kid, wake up. You're scaring your neighbours."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 08:32 am UTC (link)
Genma surfaced from the dream with the violence of a volcanic eruption. One minute he was reliving some of the worst moments of his life, and the next he was crouched on his bed, tangled in sheets, throwing a kunai he didn't remember reaching for and already channeling chakra to cast a defensive lightning jutsu and protect himself from the intruder.

He appeared alert, bristling with battle presence, but he still wasn't quite clear of the dream. There was blinding light dazzling his eyes, and someone shouting for him with a chakra presence that seemed familiar, and for a long moment he hesitated, searching. What he saw, when he looked at Raidou, was not a half-dressed, scarred man with sleep in his eyes and a wary expression. He saw the white undershirt Raidou was wearing and the black sleeping pants, and in his mind they became ANBU's bone-colored armor and inky uniform.

It was rescue, at long last.

Genma sagged back on the bed, aching in every joint and muscle, and stared at his hands. They should be mashed to a pulp. They should hurt--and they did--and that kid should be here, screaming for mercy. There should be dead Stone ninja and more ANBU swarming in and...

His heart raced, breath came in sharp panicky gasps. But the ANBU was still there and real, really here. Genma focused on that, on Raidou standing there, and tried desperately to make sense of where he was. His hands hurt. He could feel the hurt, but there was no blood. No corpses. And then his darting eyes fixed on the shrine on his floor.

He was home.

The disorientation was too much, too fast, too overwhelming. He choked on a gag and curled up around himself, into himself. Knees up, hands clutched close to his chest.

It was probably all a hallucination. They were probably coming back to question him again. He'd hallucinated about home too many times during that miserable three weeks in captivity for this to be anything but another illusion.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 08:58 am UTC (link)
Raidou wasn't quite sure what had happened. The attack he'd been expecting and had dodged accordingly, but the shift from confusion to painful hope to... something, threw him. Genma had looked crushed. Nauseated. Devastated. He definitely wasn't attacking anymore. Raidou stared down at the shaking, slender body curled up in front of him and felt very out of his depth. This wasn't the Genma he remembered. But then again, he'd only met the man once.

Raidou listened to the rattle-fire of panicked breathing for a moment, and then finally shook his head. He hadn't started this thing, whatever it was, but he'd forced his way in and now he was here he wasn't going to simply walk away and leave a comrade to break alone. He moved slowly and sat down on the bed, feeling it dip slightly under his weight, and very, very carefully laid the flat of his hand on Genma's back, square between the sharp lines of his shoulderblades. He could feel sweat under his fingers, and the pearly line of Genma's spine fixed between shivering muscles. A rapid tempo heartbeat that was far too fast.

"Hey, kid. Didn't think I'd see you so soon, especially not next to my new place. Strange coincidence, huh?" Raidou wondered if this was a regular thing. Perhaps this was why the former owner of his place had moved out -- one too many nights screamed awake. Raidou moved his hand, letting it sweep down the length of Genma's back and back up again. "So, guess what I did today? Moved into the place next to you for a start. Got a free plant, too. It's half dead, but I think there's still hope for it if I remember to keep watering it."

Raidou doubted it mattered what he talked about, as long as there was a calm voice in the room. A human being in pain never made for a great listener.

"I made sukiyaki for a flat-warming dinner," he continued, and kept rubbing Genma's back, "there's still some in my fridge if you want to come around later. Oh, and I bought a new book. Very trashy. It's set two-hundred years ago in Suna, have you seen the ruins there? Beautiful place..."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 09:04 am UTC (link)
Genma found his way back to the present slowly. Raidou's touch was the anchor-line he clung to. In all his nightmares and daymares and hallucinations in that Iwagakure hell hole, he'd never once felt the touch of the comrades his mind invented to keep him sane. The only soothing touch had come from that medic, and that only so he would be strong enough to take the next interrogation session. It hadn't been until three weeks had gone by and the rescue team had finally arrived that a gentle, firm, broad hand had pressed his spine, and a rich, raspy voice had told him, "Hang on, son. We're going to get you home now. Just hang on."

So it was the touch, that hand on his back, that convinced him it really was a rescue at last. And from that he could calm down and take in the fact that he was home. Home safe, in his own place, with hands long healed, other tortures only faint scars, silvery and slick.

"Moved in..." Genma echoed dully, and uncurled a little, lifting a pale, sweaty face to look at his companion.

"Raidou?" What was he doing here? His mission partner from a week ago. His mission partner who'd bandaged his hand and told him the truth about himself, and listened to Genma's truth. He could still feel the itchy pull of the healing scab on his shoulder, another on his temple, where Raidou had patched him up after that mission.

The cut on his hand, though, there was almost no trace of that anymore. The medics had been very careful to heal that up when Genma and Raidou had reported in. Oda-sensei, the hand specialist, had given Genma a careful look and a fresh bottle of pills when he'd sent him on his way. Take one of these before you sleep every night for the next week or so, he'd told Genma. Genma had been irked to find the next day that Oda had signed him out on a medical. No missions for a week. For a stupid little scratch. But he'd dutifully taken the pills for the first three or four nights. Then he'd decided he really didn't need them. It didn't really hurt any more than usual, after all.

Maybe it wasn't the pain in Genma's hand that had had him worried.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 09:06 am UTC (link)
"Well remembered," said Raidou, with real warmth in his voice under the knee-jerk wryness. "If you get my family name, too, I'll be truly impressed." He didn't stop the movement of his hand, only paused it a moment to give Genma's shoulder a brief squeeze before he resumed rubbing his back. It seemed to be helping, and Raidou wasn't one to let a good thing go. Besides, if it worked for ten-year-olds after a screaming set of nightmares, why shouldn't it work for twenty-two-year-olds? Some things stayed comforting no matter how old and elite you got.

Not that Genma looked particularly elite right now, mostly he looked half scared out of his mind. Raidou wasn't fooled; he'd had to move quick enough to dodge that kunai to know Genma was still capable of putting up a hell of a fight if he chose to. But that was the gig, you could fight through anything if it came down to it, even if it felt like it would tear whatever was left of yourself into shreds to do it.

Raidou shook his head with a quick jerk. Genma was more then hurting enough for the both of them without him adding his own gloom to the mix.

"So," he said softly, watching the man still curled up next to his knee, "Want to talk about it? Or should I keep telling you about my new book? I think it's going to have pirates fairly soon. Though how the hell they end up in Suna two-hundred years ago, I have no idea."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 09:08 am UTC (link)
"Namiashi," Genma said, with just the shallowest trace of a smile. He could feel himself shaking now, and Raidou's steady soothing touch was a strong contrast. He felt wraithlike, insubstantial, next to the other man, and part of him wanted to lean exhausted against him and let the touch fill him with life again.

Another part, though, was appalled at how terribly, terribly weak he was being. He took a shaky breath and uncurled a little, swallowing against a lingering nausea--the sensation of the Iwa medics forcing a tube down his throat to pour nutrients past his rebellious jaws came back full force, and he gagged, and curled up again.

He wanted to be strong, but he wasn't. Not right now.

At least Raidou wasn't saying anything to condemn him. Wasn't moving away. Wasn't bundling him up in a jutsu of a straitjacket and handing him over to psych.

"Maybe they were sand pirates," he offered weakly, from inside his curl. Keep talking about your book. Anything. Keep talking so I can keep here in the present and not... there.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 09:09 am UTC (link)
"I am truly impressed," Raidou said solemnly, but his slight smile wiped away when Genma gagged and choked and curled right back up. "Easy, kid," he whispered softly, "Take it easy. It'll pass."

It damn well better. Raidou couldn't imagine anything less appealing then having to drag Genma out of his own room -- his very likely sanctuary -- and leave him in the sterile care of ANBU's psych agents. He wasn't going to do that, not unless he absolutely had to.

There was something else he could do, though. Raidou studied the length of Genma's back for a moment, absently noting the tracery of scars and dismissing them as unimportant, and then lifted his other hand, placing it alongside the first. He gathered a little of his chakra, letting it seep into his fingers and warm them, and then changed the smooth sweep he had been working with to something much more precise, seeking out the knots of tension in the muscles and carefully releasing them. Raidou wasn't as skilled as a medic, and he certainly wasn't a masseur by any stretch of the imagination, but he knew how the human body worked, and he definitely knew enough about pressure points and nerve bundles to trick Genma's body into releasing some much needed endorphins into his bloodstream.

This was, he realized, a damn weird way to spend the first night in his new place. But stranger things had happened.

Raidou shifted slightly, letting his leg move to rest lightly against Genma's lower back -- enough steady touch to be, hopefully, reassuring without crowding him -- and worked on the rigid lines of his shoulders. "Sand pirates, huh?" he said, willing to keep up a steady stream of talk. "I guess that's possible. I don't think they'd find a lot of treasure near Suna, though. Unless their taste runs toward a whole lotta rock."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 09:14 am UTC (link)
Genma shivered, taking deeper breaths, willing the nausea away. He stared at his own bare feet, knobby and bony like his hands, though not so terribly abused. The dream was still with him and he could feel a twinge of an ache in his metatarsals. They'd been broken less badly, healed not-so-carefully by the Iwa medic, and again with much greater care by the doctors in Konoha. He remembered the first steps he'd taken, back in Konoha's hospital, carefully supported by a nurse on either side. His hands had still been encased in massive splints, his body frail and weak, nearly twenty kilos underweight. He'd trailed IV and catheter lines, heart monitor and oxygen tubing. And he'd been terrified they weren't going to support his weight. So grateful to the Konoha medics when they did. It was the first of many trials he'd faced, and eventually overcome, on the road back to active service in ANBU.

He wasn't backsliding now. Not over a stupid little cut on his knuckles that had already faded to a thin pink line.

He took another breath and felt tension shuddering loose as Raidou worked at the knots in his back. It was oddly intimate, but not awkward, he realized. He felt protected with this man, still hardly more than a stranger. Protected, but not condescended to. Raidou's touch, his presence, conveyed a kind of respectful comradeship. He's been here, Genma thought. Where I am. Not exactly here but.... He understands.

"You... really moved in next door?" he asked, not sure whether Raidou had actually said that or he'd only imagined it. He took another slow breath, raising his head a little, feeling the barbed-wire coils of tension ease away under Raidou's steady probing. The neighboring apartment hadn't been vacant long. Aburai Satoshi's name was still the most recent one chiseled into the monument. He'd been a good neighbor. Decent guy, good ninja. He'd been unlucky.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 09:15 am UTC (link)
"Yep," said Raidou, as he turned his attention to a particularly stubborn knot, kneading it steadily with his fingers until it released and dragged a little shiver and gasp out of Genma. "Used to live down on the first floor, but my neighbour tried to take the messy way out about a week back. Found her in time, and the medics got her stitched back together, but--" he hesitated slightly, brow furrowing, "there's pretty much no way she's coming back and... well, I didn't feel good about living there anymore. Besides, my new place has a window. I'm willing to take a little luxury when I can."

Hishida Katsue. She'd made a hell of a mess carving her arms up like that. Raidou had breathed blood for a week before he'd finally given up the fight against getting chased out of his home of the last four years and moved up to some sunlight. He dug his fingers firmly into the solid muscle lining the backs of Genma's ribs and threw his focus into working out every single patch of tension he could find. Maybe that was why he hadn't left yet. Not willing to turn a corner and smell the butcher stink of another teammate trying to fling themselves off the mortal coil.

Hell, they had enough enemies willing to slice them each a bright red neck smile without adding to the body count themselves.

Stupid woman. If only she'd asked for some help.

Raidou shook his head. There was no point dwelling on it now. He was here, and even if Genma hadn't asked for his help, he wasn't turning it away either. "New place came with a plant, too," he said for the second time, "I think I'm going to have to give it a name. For luck, y'know. Any thoughts?"

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 09:18 am UTC (link)
First floor, a week ago... Genma'd heard about it, through the grapevine. A kunoichi he hadn't known. The rumor mill said she'd been on the wrong side of a bad break up, and that she'd been pregnant. But that was the sort of thing the rumor mill liked to say. For all he knew, she'd just had one too many missions, lost one too many comrades, probably slept with one too many targets she then had to kill. In fact, maybe that was the source of the pregnancy rumor. It was unusual, but it happened. Contraceptives failed, kunoichi got pregnant. There was a particular shrine on the grounds of the temple Genma liked to pray at, tucked away in a shady grove of plum trees that blossomed into ethereal beauty every February. A shrine filled with little Jizo statues wearing hand-knit caps and bibs--effigies for the babies that were sacrificed to Konoha before their births.

"Good reason to move," he said, in a voice too raspy and tremulous to be his. There wasn't much more to say, really. It was disturbing to come across a fellow agent breaking. As Genma realized he was himself pretty much doing right now. Should have taken those pills, although perhaps they'd only have postponed the inevitable.

Raidou's hands were slowly, steadily, working a sort of magic. Unknotting muscles that had held their tension for hours, months, maybe a lifetime. Every so often some little point would shudder free, and with it came a rush of tears, or laughter. Little tiny moments unlocked from where they'd been held in tight repression. Genma tried to talk around it. Pretend it wasn't happening. Just let the slowly rising tide of calm fill him up, as Raidou washed the debris away with his massage.

"Don't worry, I'm not gonna off myself," he said. "Just had a bad nightmare." He knew Raidou knew about nightmares. He'd said as much, only a week ago, in that motel room after their mission. He needed to focus on the now. On Raidou here. On what he was saying.

"Guy who had that room--Satoshi--don't think he ever named his plant. Maybe you should just call it Lucky-chan."

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 09:36 am UTC (link)
Raidou's mouth twisted slightly. "Kid, if I thought you were going to off yourself, do you think we'd be still sitting here?" Genma was having a bad night, a very bad night, but so far he hadn't done anything Raidou wouldn't do. Well, except cry, but you couldn't drag a man down to psych for shedding a few tears. Bad dreams happened, and Genma had more reason to have them then most, he was entitled to the time needed to gather himself before dawn broke.

Raidou spared a moment to hope he wasn't making a very foolish mistake.

A movement of hands provoked a shiver and a little wreckage of laughter from Genma as Raidou released something. He'd grown used to such moments by now and made no comment. The first time he'd accidentally dragged a new shudder of sobs from the man still curled against his knee, Raidou had almost stopped there and then, convinced he was doing Genma more harm then good. But now he realized -- he hoped -- he was doing something useful, getting some of the poison out maybe.

"I like Lucky-chan," he said softly, voice a little worn by this point with the steady chatter he'd tried to keep up. "Good name for a plant." To be honest, Raidou didn't much care what he called the little piece of half-dead foliage on his new windowsill, but he'd asked the question so he'd take the answer. Hell, perhaps he'd call it Satoshi in recognition of its former owner, whatever had happened to the man.

Raidou laid his hands fall flat against Genma's skin, letting his slightly achy fingers rest a moment, and gently dragged his callused palms down the length of Genma's back, keeping up a steady movement. He wasn't quite sure what he was going to do when this idea ran out on him. Get up and make tea, perhaps. Or cook something as he used to do for one of his brothers when they woke in the night and shared their unhappiness with him.

He had no idea what he was going to do in the light of day.

"The option to talk about it is still there, you know," Raidou said finally. "I'll listen."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-03 09:56 am UTC (link)
Genma relaxed a bit as Raidou's touch changed from deep massage to light caress. He felt worn out, wrung out, like he'd actually been vomiting, not just swallowing against the surges of bile the dream brought. Slowly, carefully, he eased himself up, out of his tight little curl, lifting his head, leaning back so he could really see the man who'd come to his aid.

"I don't know what I'd say," he said, with a shaky half-laugh. "It's... Fallout. From before. Probably." He looked down at his hand, at the tiny pink scar that would undoubtedly fade to nothing, especially against the background of its many brethren, then held it up so Raidou could see. "See, already healed. They always heal my hands up if they can. It's dumb. Oda-sensei took me off duty--guess this is why." He laughed again, and watched Raidou carefully. Hoping for understanding on that scarred face, in those deep-set brown eyes.

"Not even an anniversary or anything dumb like that. Psych guys always like to make a big deal about anniversaries. I'm supposed to break in March, not May." The end of February was when he'd taken that mission. Nearing the end of March when the rescue squad finally came. By May... By May Kobe and Seijuro's names were chiseled on the monument, and Genma was eating solid food, walking around still with the help of a nurse because his splinted hands couldn't hold canes, spending hours in the exquisite torture of physical and occupational therapy, facing surgeries nearly every week, to aid his healing hands.

Having nightmares like the one he'd just woken from every night.

"You... you ever have it hit you out of the blue like that? No reason for it?"

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-03 08:25 pm UTC (link)
Raidou was so pleased to see Genma finally uncurl and sit up that he smiled at him; a wide, broken looking curve of lips that lifted one side of his mouth higher then the other. It'd been that way since the war. The reason for it was the same reason Raidou's particular role in the war had ended -- anyone who looked at his face could take a fairly accurate guess why. He let his hands drop away from Genma's back to rest on his knees, fingers loosely curled. His gaze turned from his own knuckles, ridged and calloused with their repeated application to various bits of people, to Genma's, crooked and broken by a weapon he hadn't named. To the slender line that was all that remained of the minor wound he'd taken on the mission where he'd danced like a jungle cat and slain like a ninja.

It didn't take much for Raidou to put two and two together. That fucking target with his thing for grabbing Genma's hands. Raidou figured he'd be fairly pleased with this particular result; not many targets reduced their assassins to screaming nightmares and tears a week later.

Bastard. If there was a hell, Raidou hoped he was cooking in it. And that the Iwa-nin who'd started this whole miserable thing were screaming down there, too.

March, not May. Raidou honestly didn't have it in him to ask Genma if he had broken in March. He wasn't sure he wanted to know.

Raidou leaned his back against the wall, drawing his knees up and resting his forearms on the joints to let his hands dangle between them. He winced slightly as he shifted. "Pins and needles," he explained at Genma's questioning look, and resisted the urge to get up and stamp. "And yeah, I've had it take me funny a few times."

That was the problem with offering to let someone talk, sometimes the rare one wanted you to talk back. Raidou didn't think he had it in him to say no to that, either. He looked at the far wall of Genma's apartment -- the identical beige to his own -- and let out a slow breath as he thought. "I was on a mission in my rookie year and took a crack across the cheek." He didn't have to say which cheek. "Split my mask and gave me a scratch. Just a little thing, not even as bad as your hand. I spent most of that night puking my guts up." He snorted softly, "My squad leader thought I'd lost my mind. Don't think I've ever had anyone yell at me so much."

Raidou didn't have particularly fond memories of that squad leader.

"You just do whatever the hell it takes to get through it, I guess."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-04 05:43 am UTC (link)
"Yeah," Genma agreed, and found himself looking at Raidou's face. Raidou sat stonily still, face turned in profile, staring at the wall as if trying to see through a genjutsu; his jaw clenched and unclenched, a subtle motion of muscle making the scarred skin above it ripple. Genma could tell his scrutiny was both expected and terribly uncomfortable for the other man, and didn't spend long at it, but since Raidou was plainly offering him the opportunity, he took it. He could see much more clearly the extent of the damage now, with Raidou in only a thin tank top. It wasn't just his cheek that was creased and textured with too-shiny, plastic looking scars; they extended down his neck, over his shoulder, probably across his chest. There was no sign of a secondary mark where the scratch Raidou had mentioned might have been, but in the context of that scar it was unsurprising. It would take a massive wound to leave a noticeable mark on top of what was already there.

"When were you a rookie?" Genma asked, turning his head away with exaggerated motion. He knew how painful the bore of a stare could be. "Whoever your squad leader was must have been a really unfeeling asshole. Shit, I get why some of the shinobi I've partnered with can't understand why I have an issue with my hands. You have to know my history, or be really looking at them, to know there's even a problem, and if I've got gloves on... But fuck. No offense, but I think it would take a real idiot not to get that you might be triggered by having you mask split and that same cheek injured."

He was talking too much, he thought, and bit down on his tongue then. It wasn't his place to comment. Wasn't right. He was the one with sweat and tears still drying in salty traces on his face.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-04 06:41 am UTC (link)
Raidou was not a man who took sympathy well, not matter how genuine its intention. To require sympathy was to be weak, and to be weak was to be useless, and to be useless was everything a ninja was not. Everything Raidou was not. He was even less thrilled with the momentary violation of Genma's stare, despite bracing himself for it. His teeth clenched and relaxed as he studied the opposite wall of the apartment with equal intensity, holding himself carefully still.

It was pathetic how relieved he felt when Genma turned away.

Raidou scowled hard enough to give himself a headache and got to his feet, walking from the bed to Genma's small kitchenette set up with the intention of finding something to occupy his hands. Anything that would be useful and not hurtful. He had enough self control to realize snapping at the man he'd just spent time dragging back from the brink was not only a study in idiocy, it would also be a pointless cruelty. "Five years," he told the cabinets as he opened them one by one. "I was a rookie almost five years ago. Joined up just after the fox."

He'd been needed and they'd been desperate enough to accept just about anyone. Raidou's tattoo had barely had time to scab before he'd run his first A-rank. But it had been the same for everyone back then; no manpower, no rest, and a building full of agents walking the razor wire edge between insanity and death.

It'd been a hell of an introduction to the Black Ops.

Raidou found something that looked like an entire tea store crammed into one cupboard. He stared a little blindly at the carefully arranged boxes and tried to turn his attention from the memory of scrabbling on his hands and knees, coughing up bile and terrified rage while angry yells rang in his ears and became genin screams, to... what the hell was rose petal and lychee black tea? He blinked and pulled down the box to study it.

"Hoshino Saita," he said finally, turning the little container over to read the kanji description on the back. "You've probably heard the name. He wasn't exactly renowned for being the most people-friendly of commanders." Hardcore didn't cut it as a description. Raidou had looked up to Hoshino for a while, but hero worship only stretched to a point before it shattered.

It was sort of like ninja in that respect.

"Still went to his funeral when he died, though," said Raidou, with very little inflection. "You want some tea?"

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-04 07:58 am UTC (link)
"Saita?" Genma echoed. "He was a crazy mofo. I had a mission with him just once--made sure to stay the hell away from him after that. Damn." He shook his head in sympathy, not really expecting an answer, and watched Raidou poking through his cabinets. Was Raidou always that invasive, or was it just anxiety making him do that? Well, it didn't matter. There was nothing in those cabinets Genma had to hide.

"Tea's good" he said. "Pick anything you like. The water heater's already on, should be filled." He figured Raidou would find the pots and cups easily enough, or ask if he didn't.

Nervous energy might have motivated the other man to get up, but it gave Genma a much needed chance to try to pull himself together a little more, too. He stood up shakily and tugged at the twisted, sweat-damp sheets, straightening them out and smoothing a worn blue and green quilt over the bed. It would give them a place to sit, and hide the evidence of his break just a little bit. "I'm gonna wash my face. Feel free to snag anything you want from there. There's oranges in the fridge," he offered and slipped into his tiny washroom.

Toilet, mirrored cabinet, and a sink, no shower. It was good enough. He flipped the toilet lid up and relieved himself, then ran the water in the sink until it was ice cold and splashed it over his face and chest. Wake up, Shiranui. Wake up, wake up, wake up. When he stepped back out he almost didn't feel the miserable ache in his hands. Almost.

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-06 05:31 am UTC (link)
Raidou wasn't much of a tea drinker, being the type of person to prefer coffee so strong it was almost a life force in and of itself, but so late in the night it was early morning was never a good time for a caffeine shot. Not unless you were gearing up to run a mission anyway. He looked through Genma's tea shrine cupboard, trying to find something he recognized, and finally picked a box at random on the basis that he liked the colours.

Raidou regarded Genma's water heater with a slightly impressed look -- that was a fairly expensive little bit of luxury, unless you happened to be lucky enough to inherit one -- and made two mugs of what he was referring to as Dark Blue tea. While he waited for Genma to clean himself up a little, Raidou took the opportunity to glance around the home he'd taken into his head to invade at what felt like four am. Genma's apartment was not all that different to his own new place; a little on the larger side, and a little on the messier side, and Raidou certainly didn't fall asleep reading books on the effects of lizard poisons, but it held the same basic things. The only thing that he had no real equivalent to was the broken shrine leaning against one wall. It was singed on one side, the wood burned black in what he could only assume had been some sort of accidental fire, and judging by the polished sheen of the lacquer, it was obviously well cared for. Something important, then.

Raidou got two oranges out of the fridge and peeled them neatly, setting the segments on the counter when he couldn't find a plate. The citrus bloom of orange was sharp and clean against the stale scent of sweat and fear. He ate a segment neatly and tossed the pip that made an effort to crack a molar neatly in the trash.

Raidou glanced up as Genma walked out of the bathroom, skin newly pink and hair slightly damp. He looked a little better in the aftershock way most trauma victims had; pale and shaky, but definitely more collected; gathering calm around him with the expertise of one used to such an exercise. Raidou offered him a mug of fragrant tea that was sadly not blue. "As fetishes go," he said quietly, tone once more returning to its usual slightly wry low key, "tea is a new one on me. Are you planning to sell this stuff or do you just like to horde it?"

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-06 05:37 am UTC (link)
The scent of the oranges was sweet and enticing, and as the adrenaline rush of the nightmare finally let go Genma craved the sugar. He padded into the little kitchen with Raidou and reached up to the top of one cupboard to get a small lacquer tray--round with one flat edge, and decorated with a pair of rabbits frolicking under a spring moon and a rain of cherry blossoms--and held it almost steady for Raidou to put the oranges and mugs of tea on. "I like tea," he said simply, and sniffed at the rich aroma that rose from the steaming mugs. "You picked a good one. Haven't had that one in a while."

He headed back over to the bed once the tray was loaded, assuming Raidou would follow. It wasn't until he had himself settled on the bed, legs tucked up under him, aching hands wrapped around the hot mug, that he glanced at the door with its broken seals. "You broke in." It was a statement, not an accusation. "Why?"

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-06 05:40 am UTC (link)
Raidou hesitated as he shadowed Genma back to the bed, and glanced at the door, following Genma's line of sight. "I knocked first," he said after a moment, "I don't think you heard me." He could probably have knocked harder, but it had seemed so important to get in and find out why someone was screaming -- and put a stop to whatever was making them hurt that way -- that Raidou had abandoned social niceties.

He looked at Genma again, feeling suddenly a little awkward. It was one thing to deal with a crisis, but quite another to stand in the aftermath and make small talk.

And there was something about Genma's question he didn't like. It didn't sound like the justified annoyance Raidou had expected and prepared to deal with -- Why did you break into my apartment, nosy ass? -- it sounded more like... Why did you bother?

Raidou opened his mouth, hesitated again, and closed it. He moved and sat down on the bed next to Genma, leaving a careful amount of space between the two of them, preferring not to crowd the man. Then he picked up a mug of tea and balanced it on one bent knee, feeling the warmth bleed through the thin cloth of his sleeping slacks.

Why had he bothered?

Raidou took a sip of his tea and leaned back against the wall. "Seemed the thing to do."

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[info]fallen_senbon
2008-02-06 05:42 am UTC (link)
It would have been easy to bristle. To let familiar defensive walls rise up and block out this nosy new neighbor who broke in to wake Genma from his nightmares 'just because'. It would have been easy, and in fact the words nearly floated out. The thing to do? You that bored? You make a hobby of picking up the pieces when your neighbors self-destruct? It would have been easy, and it would have driven the other man so far away, given what he'd said about the reason for his move, that Genma would undoubtedly never see him again.

Maybe a few years ago he would have said it. When the events that prompted that dream were fresher, and Genma was rawer. But he looked at Raidou with his crooked smile and his honest concern. Raidou who'd been more than a decent mission partner; who had the potential, Genma felt instinctively, to be more than a decent friend, and he found different words instead. Better ones.

"Thanks."

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[info]fallen_raidou
2008-02-06 05:45 am UTC (link)
It was funny how the world could pivot on a single word for a moment. Raidou paused with his mug halfway to his mouth and gave Genma a look that kiltered around astonished before his lips quirked without his say so, lifting up into another lopsided smile. For a night spent in the company of a man who was far south of happy, he seemed to be smiling an awful lot.

Possibly there was something in the tea.

Raidou picked up a segment of orange and held it gently, feeling the weight of the little piece of fruit against the pads of his fingertips. He turned it over, admiring the way the light gleamed on the fragile, translucent skin, and tried to think of a reply that wouldn't horribly embarrass them both.

It was easy, in the end, to remember a lesson from childhood. He popped the segment in his mouth, enjoyed the little burst of flavour that went so oddly well with his not-blue tea, and shrugged with one shoulder.

"Welcome."

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