InsaneJournal

Who: Mr. Hyde and Zombie Angel (Wash and Katou)
What: Bumping into one another while running.
When: Recently
Where: Some park.
Warnings/Ratings: Language. Some minor addiction stuff.
Status: Complete when Posted


If watching his best friend get cut down in front of his eyes and not being able to do anything about it hadn’t made Katou’s resolution to stay clean hard, waking up one morning thinking he was someone completely different was. There had been a point when Katou had been stoked to get new dreams, thinking they were probably the greatest thing that had ever happened to him, but lately he’d been a little less excited about the whole thing.

Keeping his mind off Kira and Setsuna and drugs had been incredibly hard, and so he’d been working extra hard on distracting himself. On the bright side, his grades in summer school were the best ones he’d had in over six years, he was getting surprisingly proficient at guitar, and all the working out he was doing was giving him honest to goodness muscles. Though the problem with getting in better shape was that running didn’t take all his concentration anymore, so during his disgustingly early morning run, his mind was wandering, running scenes of his dreams through his mind again and trying to think of anything he could do to change them. Loud, angry music was blasting through his headphones, and he wasn’t paying attention at all to running, but he wasn’t that concerned about it. This early in the morning the only other people in the park were die-hard runners, and he could let everyone else running worry about not crashing into him.

When he had first joined the Marines ten years ago Wash had loathed early morning runs. He hadn’t exactly been the most athletic kid in high school and boot camp had nearly killed him. Sometimes the only thing that had kept him going was the fact that if he dropped out, his only option was to go back home to a stepfather that just as soon hit him as look at him and a mother who was too afraid of being on her own to actually protect her son. So he sucked it up and ran those early morning runs, grunting with his fellow recruits in response to the drill sergeant's call-outs.

By the time boot camp was over, Wash had accepted that even though he had been born and raised in Spokane, WA, he had no family there. The Marines had molded him into something better than where he had come from. The corps had given him everything he had been missing: a place to belong; a purpose; a family.

Hoo-ah.

In a blink of an eye it was all gone. He hadn’t caused the Jeep to flip - hell, he hadn’t even been driving - but he may as well had as far as he was concerned. The head injury, the coma, the discharge - all of it was because he just hadn’t been good enough, just like his step-father had always told him.
Wash was trying to cling to that life, he knew that. He lived in Seal Beach, as close to the base as he could. He could see it from his apartment’s living room window. He wore his combat boots religiously. He went for early morning runs, grunting as though a drill sergeant was still making call-outs. It was all in vain, but it was all he had left.

The problem with running is that the runner can find themselves lost in their own thoughts, and that was where Wash was. So much so that he didn’t notice the jogger ahead of him right away. When the bouncing blond hair in front of him finally registered as another jogger, Wash barely had enough time to call out “on your left” as he attempted to pass him, let alone enough time to alter his course enough to avoid the young man. Despite his efforts otherwise, his shoulder knocked into the other man as he passed.

Katou definitely did not notice the guy coming towards him until the guy had already crashed into his shoulder, jolting him from his thoughts about Setsuna and Kira and the things he should have done in order to save them. He stumbled for a couple of steps, but managed to catch himself before crashing into the ground. Once he regained his footing he spun on the ball of his foot, ripping his ear buds out as he turned. "What, are you fucking blind?" Katou snapped.

What a fucking way to start the day.

Wash had his mouth open to apologize to the guy for running into him, but his apology died on his tongue the minute the guy whirled on him. His jaw clenched and his hackles rose. “Hey, I said ‘on your left’, asshole. Its not my fault you’re fucking deaf.” his voice rose in pitch the angrier he got. “What the hell are you listening to so loudly you can’t hear someone come up behind you?”

Katou started at the guy like he had grown a second head. “Music, obviously. What the fuck do you think I’d be listening to, a fucking sermon?” It was far too early in the morning for Katou to deal with an idiot like this guy. “If you’d been paying attention in the first place, we wouldn’t’ve had to worry about yelling ‘on your left,’” this said in a rather mocking tone of voice, “now would we have?”

And Wash was in no mood to deal with a smart-mouthed punk this early in the morning either. “You’re supposed to say ‘on your left’ when passing someone!” Wash snapped back, his voice raising in pitch a little more. “It’s common fucking courtesy so people know where the fuck you are when you pass them!”

Technically the collision had been his fault. The kid didn’t exactly have eyes in the back of his head. And he should have called ‘on your left’ several steps before he actually had. He had been the one not paying attention to what was infront of him. He should have known better.

You’re such an idiot, Wash

Wash took a deep breath and willed himself to calm down. “Okay,” he said finally, his voice back to normal and somewhat calmer than it had been before. “Look, I’m sorry, alright. I didn’t mean to crash into you like that.”

Katou eyed the guy who had crashed in to him for a moment, almost suspiciously, before he shrugged and an easy grin crossed his face, a complete 180 in his demeanor. “No harm, no foul, eh?” Katou said, pulling a pack of smokes from his shirt pocket and sticking one in his mouth. “I mean, we’ve all got off days and just because you probably shouldn’t be running when you can’t see things that are right in front your eyes doesn’t mean you can’t,” this all said in what might have been considered a friendly, incredibly understanding tone of voice if the words Katou spoke weren’t supposed to also be mildly insulting. “Smoke?” he asked, offering the open pack so the guy could grab one if he wanted.

There was something familiar about this asshole.

“No, thanks,” Wash answered flatly. His eyes narrowed slightly. “I can see just fine,” he said. Right now, any way “But yeah, its an off day. We all have them. I mean just because you probably shouldn’t be running when you can’t hear someone in combat boots come up behind you doesn’t mean you can’t either, right? Alls fair.” Like the young man’s had been, Wash’s tone was friendly even if the smirk on his face and his words were decidedly not.

Katou shrugged at his refusal and tucked the pack of smokes back into his pocket. A look of badly feigned horror crossed Katou’s face. “That’s cold, man. You don’t think deaf people should run? They’ve got rights too, you know.” Not that Katou particularly cared, but it would be interesting to see this guy try to backtrack. He took a look at the guy, top to bottom. “Just ‘cause they’re not in the military don’t mean they don’t exist you know.”

“If I can run blind, you can run deaf,” Wash said. He folded his arms over his chest. “Like I said, alls fair.” It was too early in the morning for this shit. He hadn’t even had his coffee yet, the disgusting black yet necessary bane of his existence. He needed at least one cup before having to deal with a mouthy little -
Wait a minute.

Wash narrowed his eyes again at the young blond man in front of him. This time more scrutingly than angrily. He was sure he’d never seen him before and yet…

“Do I know you?”

“I think it’s pretty well established that blind people need like, dogs or those sticks or whatever to get around,” Katou said. “I don’t see ya with either of those.”

Katou gave the dude another once over at his question, though nothing really rang any bells. “I dunno, maybe. I used ta know a lot of people. Maybe you used to be one of my customers,” there had been a time not too long ago when Katou had made his money by seeing weed and blow. “Name’s Katou.”

Jesus Christ.

Yes, he was staring and he really didn’t care. His anger and annoyance forgotten for the moment as was the comment about the seeing eye dog and cane. How many Katous could there possibly be in Orange County? And of all the people Wash could bump into this early in the morning. “Zombie Angel?”

If it didn’t turn out to be the mouthy teen from the net then one of two things was going to happen: either the guy would get weirded out and go on his way and leave Wash alone OR he’d punch him. Either way would put an end to this awkward stand-off rather quickly.

The staring was weird and Katou was going to say something until the guy burst out with 'Zombie Angel' and there was almost a moment of confusion before it sunk in where he had heard that particular nickname before.

Katou burst out laughing, almost doubled over, and it was a moment before he regained his composure with a drag from his cigarette. "Holy shit, Hyde? Small world. How the fuck's it going?"

The snide smile was replaced with a fainter, but more friendly one. “It’s Wash actually,” he corrected, but only half-heartedly. He had a feeling that Hyde was going to be a nickname he wasn’t going to shake any time soon. Considering the Dreams he was currently having the name made sense.

“It’s going alright,” he kind-of-sort-of lied. He gave a half smirk, “well, at least until I ran into some punk while out on a run. You?”

“Hyde’s better,” Katou snorted. “Thing’s’ve been awesome,” Katou said, lying through his teeth. It wasn’t like he needed to spill all his problems to some guy though. “I mean, minus the whole getting up ridiculously early to go for a run and practically getting mowed down.” He grinned a little. “Though really, made the whole thing more interesting. Running’s pretty boring. Don’t know how you do it without no tunes.”

Wash shrugged. “Force of habit, I guess,” he said. “They don’t exactly let you wear headphones in boot camp.” He wasn’t sure he could even run with the distraction of music blaring in his ears. Being tuned out from the world around him was one thing when he was lost in his own thoughts. It was an entirely different matter when he couldn’t actually hear anything. The idea of it dredged up an unpleasant memory of his ears ringing as he tried to avoid getting shot during an ambush in what was supposed to be an abandoned desert village and-

Stop it!

Wash shook his head slightly, and reached up to rub the back of his neck. His efforts to remain nonchalant made the grin on his face feel forced. “It is boring,” he admitted. “Like really boring. I actually hate running, but,” he shrugged, “old habits die hard.” Like wearing combat boots instead of sneakers. “What about you? You wake up every day at the asscrack of dawn to go running?”

Well, there was a dude who had something on his mind if Katou ever saw one. "Lately, sometimes," Katou said, shrugging. "I'm trying this new working out thingy and if I go out early enough I can get home in time for my roommate making breakfast and still make it to class in lotsa time." Summer school kind of sucked a lot. "But you know, I can do one handed finger push-ups and like chin-ups and shit now, so that's cool." He was working on handstand push-ups, but he could only do a couple now and only against a wall. He'd start bragging about that once he could do it without any support. "I guess we're in agreement then. Looks like you're stuck with me now." After all, running would probably be a lot more fun if he had someone to annoy along the way.

When has been the last time Wash had done a one handed push-up? As much as he wanted to keep in shape (especially considering the weight he’d lost while he’d been at the VA) push-ups had never been at the top of his list. Even running had been more of an unshakeable habit than an actual routine. Wash wondered if he could even do a one-handed push-up let alone a finger push-up. He grimaced inwardly feeling guilty if not ashamed of himself. His hand moved from the back of his neck up to the back of his head. Even though his hair covered the scar on the back of his skull, it was as though he could still feel it, visible to the entire world.

Katou was still talking about pull-ups and being in agreement and being stuck with him...

Here was where Wash raised a brow. He was, was he? After the “official” introduction they’d had with each other, Wash was a little surprised Katou wanted to stick around. Ok, sure. It’d been some time since he’d had company on a run.

He shrugged, letting his hand fall away from the back of his head. “Yeah, looks like I am.” He motioned up the jogging path, “let’s go then. I haven’t had my coffee yet this morning and the cup at the end of this is calling me pretty loudly.”