Who: Minato Namikaze & Max Trevelyan What: Meeting up for drinks When: Soon after the Breach Plot Where: A random bar Rating/Warnings: Teenish/Some talk about death, and dream amputation. Status: Complete
Things had been, well crazy was an understatement. Minato had helped fight as best he could, and had helped get people to safety when it was required of him. Minato had felt pretty good at his skills and successes, although there were some things that had started to slowly eat away at him. The dreams were, they were a blessing and a curse. He saw the face of a woman he'd loved so much every night, and the face of a son that did not, to his knowledge, live in this world. He'd learned many wonderful things from his dreams, however, there were times that he thought about the past.
He wasn't one for drinking alone, or going out dancing alone for that matter. Tonight was one of those nights though that he wanted a drink, and he'd reached out to a new friend to see if he'd like to join him. Minato was, admittedly, interested in seeing what more he could learn from Max and what else that he could tell him about his own world as well.
Arriving at the bar a few minutes prior to their arranged meeting time, Minato pulled a stool out at the actual bar and took a seat. He ran his fingers through his blonde hair, bright blue eyes taking in his surroundings and then they landed on the bar tender. He ordered a single malt scotch, two fingers, neat and then he waited on his drink and his drinking companion to arrive.
Maybe Max shouldn’t have gone out, especially now. Especially after, despite a good twelve hours of straight, dead-to-the-world sleep after closing the Breach, exhaustion settled in his bones. And his left arm, from the elbow down, was magically being amputated while he slept. He’d dreamed it before, but there in his modern-day second chance, it’d played out the same way - close rifts, make things right in the world, save the day, lose an arm.
He wasn’t sure how it felt. Couldn’t exactly pinpoint any good descriptors anyway besides off balance. Getting dressed was different, he needed help with buttons now, and the way the left sleeve of his shirt and a jacket he didn’t need in the dead of summer (but being as covered as possible seemed a decent idea) were so empty made his stomach twist. It was a collection of knives in there, no room for anything else - but he could make room for alcohol.
Heading to the designated bar, he hoped that the lack of hand wasn’t too noticable - when he got there, he immediately found a seat near his chosen company with his left arm facing away, tucked inward as he swiveled a little on his stool - his cedar-colored eyes were tired, dark circles beneath, but he still greeted Minato with a warm smile.
“Scotch, good choice,” he nodded. For Trevelyan, it was bourbon, something to sip neat with notes that invoked the taste of soft caramels. “How are you? I appreciated all your help with the latest debacle, by the way.” He’d been grateful for everyone who chose to pitch in.
"I thought it was best for taking it slow, even though I'd like to toss back shots like I'm some sort of frat boy." Minato replied with a small smirk over at Max and lifted a shoulder. "I'm hanging in there. The dreams are a bit rough on my end, but nothing I can't handle." That was the truth of the matter. Minato was able to deal with them, even if they made him question a part of his life that had long since passed.
Nodding, Minato turned his attention to the bartender for a moment as he arrived back with their drinks. "You're welcome. It was the least I could do, and as time goes on I'll be more helpful." He was certain that he would be more helpful as he learned different techniques from his dreams, but for now his knowledge was limited, or rather, his skills had not fully manifested yet. As he understood it, the longer that one dreamed the more their powers revealed themselves, but of course he could be wrong.
He didn't really understand a lot about the dreams, and so he was just dealing with them one at a time. "How about you?" He asked, casting a glance over at Max, "How are you doing after everything?" Minato raised his drink to his lips, finally taking a sip.
Tossing back shots like a frat boy, Max hadn’t done that in awhile. But maybe it was sorely needed. “Sometimes a steady stream of liquor is the best medicine,” he chuckled wryly. His own drink arrived, and he picked it up to take that first, appreciative sip - luckily, he was right-handed with most everything, that was his dominant hand. It was just that humans were creatures who were meant to be symmetrical, and missing a limb on one side really kind of offset that - it was odd, he had the strangest dizzy sensations, like he’d tip over.
“Me, well - “ He ought to just bite the bullet. Not like he hadn’t already announced he was missing an arm; it was obvious information by now anyway. Ergo, he turned a little to the side, making it so that the empty jacket sleeve was visible - only filled out from the shoulder to the elbow joint, and from there it was nothing. “The mark I used to close the rifts? In my dreamworld, it was a death sentence - it would have killed me if someone didn’t magically amputate my arm to save my life. I happened to wake up with the amputation already having happened.”
It was either that or die, and Max wasn’t too keen on that. He still had a lot of things left to do in his life.
"I think I'm getting too old to put my body through that though." Minato couldn't remember the last time he'd gotten that drunk. Maybe that would be the best medicine. He couldn't decided whether he liked this idea or not yet as he took another sip of his own scotch.
As he saw Max shifting out of the corner of his eye, Minato turned his head to fully look at his drinking companion. His brows drew together, a line appearing between them. That was shit on a lot of levels. A man had used his powers to help save the OC from destruction by monsters only to have the dreams bite him in the ass. Still, Minato understood all too well about how powers could kill a person or even doing the right thing could lead to death. "I'm sorry that you lost your arm, but I'm glad that you're still here. At least you didn't wake up bleeding or anything like that right?" Minato knew that the dreams worked differently for different people, and if he was understanding Max correctly a magical amputation didn't sound like a bloody mess. Minato took another sip of his drink, and exhaled slowly before he spoke again. "I die in my dreams. I've dreamt of my death a few times now, and even if the Kyuubi hadn't killed me a technique I used to lock part of it inside of me would've." He let out a soft sound of amusement, "I guess we'll see what happens if I actually get the seal on my stomach."
Waking up bleeding would have no doubt scared the shit out of him, and also Nasir - whom Max told about the potential for a magically amputated arm before it happened, but still. Blood always tended to induce a bit of a panic regardless. Luckily that had been spared. “Oh, no, I didn’t bleed,” he shook his head. “My arm was just...gone. In the dreams it was dissolved away, some kind of disappearing act, but it was clean. I’m looking into a few prosthetic options here though.”
Anyway, what’s done was done - if he drowned in the negativity and the mud of the trauma, he wouldn’t get anything done. Max refused to let this take him down, or impede his life - his life was already altered irrevocably, sure, but it didn’t have to mean he could never be happy again. “Dreaming of your own death is - “ He sighed, trying to think of a way to put it into words and there didn’t seem to be any severe enough. “It’s traumatic, and you shouldn’t go through it alone. So no matter what happens, at least know you have me to talk to.”
Or drink with, as the case may be. “What happens if you do get that seal? Is there a way to get rid of it?”
"Good, that's good. I hope you'll be able to find something here that'll suit your needs." He was sure that Max would be able to find something. Prosthetics were advancing every day, and Minato figured that it wasn't out of the realm of possibilities that Max would find something advance that would work for him.
Minato spared a glance over at Max, and gave a small inclination of his head. "I appreciate that, and I'll keep it in mind." It was jarring, to say the least, but Minato was okay, would be okay. Typically it just took him a few hours to work out the weird, empty feeling that followed those dreams and he worked through it. Some days it was easier than others.
Shaking his head, Minato took another sip of his drink. "No, not without releasing the yin part of the Kyuubi. Which would also kill me." Minato shrugged his shoulders, "What that will mean is that I'll hold part of the Nine-Tails chakra inside of me. It was too strong to put into my newborn son, so I summoned a Shinigami in order to extract a part of the Nine-tails before putting the other half into my son." It was complicated, to say the least, and Minato was still trying to figure out if he had a son in this life. "I thought that one day my village might need the strength of the Nine-Tails chakra, and I just knew my son would be able to handle it."
“Oh.” Max blinked, a bit surprised - because there was a lot going on there, with what Minato was saying. In fact, he picked up his drink to slosh the flavor in the glass and sip a little, to get some of that buttery caramel warmth coursing down his throat - it was soothing, and felt like his insides were turning all gooey, like melted chocolate chips. Maker bless bourbon. “So...what do you think will happen in this reality? I mean, you don’t have a son here, do you?”
And even if he did, it seemed unlikely that anything would happen if the boy (or at least, Max assumed he was a boy - Minato looked pretty young to have sired a fully grown adult) wasn’t attached to the network and experiencing dreams of his own.
"I don't think that it will effect me here. At least, I'm hoping not." Minato glanced down at the bar top, "I don't know." He admitted after a few moments, and then he took another long sip of his drink. "The only girl I ever loved is my wife in my dreams. Here she left me and went back home when we were fifteen. If I did have a son he'd be…" His brows furrowed slightly, "17 now I think." He was older than most people thought, in his early 30's but still it was entirely possible that he did have a son around somewhere.
"My first, no second dream, was of meeting him. I'd put some of my own chakra in the seal that kept the Nine-Tails locked away within him just in case it ever came close to breaking. After...something happened the seal nearly broke, and I had to make sure that it didn't break free."
Wait, what? Seventeen? Minato needed to share his secrets - maybe he’ had taken a few drinks from the Fountain of Youth or something. However, Max supposed that the idea wasn’t too entirely out there - a teenage father, perhaps? And if would be a shame, if he did indeed have a son in the world somewhere and didn’t realize he existed. Because seventeen years, that was a lot to miss.
“He’s such an important player in your dreams, sounds like,” Trevelyan noted, sipping at the bourbon steadily. “He very well could exist here. Have you ever thought of looking for him? Sorry if that’s...personal.”
The therapist in him was curious, and he didn’t mean to pry - but it was sad to think of Minato never knowing for sure, and never knowing his own son at all.
A light smile graced his lips, "I believe he was the child of prophecy that my sensei spoke of, so yeah, I'd say he's a pretty major player." Minato wasn't going to talk about how he'd seen Naruto's fight with Pain through his eyes, and had heard him talk about the death of his sensei in that world and his father in this. After that dream he'd called Jiraiya to make sure he was okay. The old man was fine, living his life as usual and that had helped to calm Minato down afterward.
His main goal had been to protect his family, his village from people that had wanted to harm them. He'd done the best that he could, and he had done just that even if it had resulted in his death. "You're fine." Minato said with a smile, "I have thought about it, especially now since I'm aware that he could be out there somewhere. I hate to think that he thinks that I left him when I didn't even know about him." Letting out a sigh, Minato polished off his drink and then motioned to the bartender for another.
It wasn't as if he didn't have the money to hire someone either, and it was time that he started trying to find someone to help him. "I should try to find someone. I'm sure there's someone on the network that can help me."
“Oh, no doubt,” Max agreed, with a nod, and he was certain that the network would have some talent to spare - seemed like you could find a bit of everything on there. “I didn’t expect to get many responses when I inquired about people who could teleport furniture, but - “ he trailed off, with a grin. Obviously, that was how he’d met Minato in the first place, so most anything was possible.
He too asked for a second drink, though this would probably be his last one - he didn’t want to go home stumbling, or have to call a cab. But the alcohol relaxed him enough to where he felt...better. Not at one-hundred percent yet, but better. “I wish you luck with it though. If you ever need anything from my end, don’t hesitate to ask.”
Minato had helped him, after all, so Trevelyan was all too happy to return the favor. Besides, friends helped each other out anyway, if they could.
With a laugh, Minato lifted a shoulder, "I thought I'd offer. I was quite proud of my teleportation skills." Minato was proud of the progress he'd made in regards to his skills from the dreams. There were still things that he was working on, but some of those things would take time. As it was, he'd learned how to climb walls using his chakra, and walking on water was slowly coming to him. The Rasengan would take some time, of that he was certain, but he'd get there eventually.
"Remind me to bring you one of the Flying Thunder God Kunai's. Just in the event that you need me, that way I can get to where you are quickly." Minato figured it was the easiest way for him to get from point A to point B, and he'd began leaving them with people just in the event that he was needed.
"I appreciate that, Max. And the same goes for me too." Minato truly meant that as well, he'd be there for his friends and help them no matter what. Minato would hate for anything to happen to the people that he considered friends, and he would do everything in his power to protect them.