It certainly wasn't just getting undressed. Kurogane had barely any sense of body shame, really, so the process of undressing was almost always a non-issue. Fay getting naked, however, didn't look performative - or fake, even, which was something - but the whole process was somehow in slow motion to Kurogane's eye, each detail magnified. Tiny individual strands of spun-gold hair floated without a hint of breeze, catching the dim light of the lanterns, and when Fay walked, Kurogane noticed that he carried a new kind of grace in his spine he hadn't seen before Celes. It was stronger, somehow - upright, soft, and almost dizzying.
That wasn't how normal people got undressed at all.
Kurogane slid a little lower under the water and stared up to the sky as Fay got in, steadfastly ignoring the way the vampire piled that hair on his head.
He drank. His arm hurt again.
"If you get drunk before we start you could miss and bite off a tendon," he grumbled by way of explanation for his urgency (and a little for distraction), though they both knew that wasn't true. Fay was too careful. Casually he lifted the wrist of his good hand, his right hand, out of the water, letting it float and bob pulse-point up on the surface of the pool so Fay could catch it.