Who: Hyde (Wash) and Katou What: First meeting after the Star of Wormwood plot When: Sometime after Katou regains his memory Where: Bar Rating/Warnings Medium to high for irresponsible alcohol consumption and allusions of drug use Status: Complete!
Katou hadn’t really wanted to see Wash when he’d come back. He hadn’t really wanted to see anyone when he’d come back. In fact, the only person he’d really wanted to see when he got his memories back was his old friend Mr. Brownstone, and that had been his first stop once he got some alone time. He’d failed them all. He’d set off the Egg of Wormwood, bringing the end of the world down around everyone’s ears. But more than anyone else, he’d failed Wash. Because of him, Wash had had that monster inside of him. Katou knew what it was like, and he wouldn’t have wished that on anyone. Katou hadn’t even known until he’d taken off.
He hadn’t really been sure how to react when Wash invited him out for drinks. He was tempted to just do a line, throw on a movie, and ignore it. But, well, he’d told himself he’d be responsible with his heroin use this time. He’d been away from it for two years, and just because he needed a little help forgetting about how he’d personally nearly destroyed both of the worlds he’d ever lived in, it didn’t mean that he was going to become a junkie.
So he left the junk in his drawer, headed to the door, slowly walked back to the drawer, and then quickly walked out the front door, empty handed, and locked it behind him.
The drive to the bar didn’t take too long, and he walked in to see Wash already sitting in a booth. Grin glued onto his face, he slid in across from him. “Holy shit man, it’s been ages since we’ve been able to do this.”
“No kidding,” Wash agreed. “Feels good doesn’t it?” He’d already had two shots and was currently nursing a glass of whiskey. He had no intention of being “responsible” with his addiction. Past experiences had shown him he couldn’t be, but Wash didn’t care. He didn’t want to be responsible. What he actually wanted he was too much of a coward to do, so instead he’d opt for a slow death – drinking until his liver, kidneys or brain failed.
He slammed back what remained in his glass as Katou sat down and then motioned for the waitress to come over. “Two beers,” he told the woman, “and two shots. My buddy here needs to catch up.”
The waitress jotted down the order, nodded at Katou with a smile before leaving to fill the order. A few minutes later two pints of delicious frosty beer sat on the table along with two shots of some other clear liquid. Wash picked up the shot in front of him and held it up as it to toast before slamming it back. Ahh, there it was. That tingling sensation that started at the back of his head that quieted everything that was swirling within; bringing calm to an otherwise uncontrollable storm. He placed the now empty shot glass upside down near the edge of the table. Then he turned scrutining grey eyes towards the younger man across the table. “You’re not really happy to see me,” he said after a moment. “So don’t waste your energy pretending that you are.”
Katou slammed back his shot with Wash, and held up two fingers to the waitress to indicate two more as he chased it with his beer.
His smile did falter when Wash mentioned that Katou wasn’t happy to see him, and after a moment he sighed, running his hand through his long, bleached hair. “I am happy to see you, man,” he said after a moment. “I'm glad to see you're okay.” Well, alive and on his way to being drunk, but it was the same thing. “I just…” he worried his lip with his teeth. “I let you down. I shoulda never let that shit happen to you.” He should have known. The Angel Sanctuary game had been in his dreams. And sure he'd been high when Rociel had been using the game to awaken, and he didn't pay attention to dweeby kids who played computer games, but he still should have known. “I don't know how you can stomach being by me. If you wanna kick my ass, I won't stop you.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Wash growled back at the younger man. “I don’t want to kick your ass. And even if I did, being told I can takes the satisfaction out of it.” He glugged down a good half of his beer. He lowered his glass and fixed Katou with intense grey eyes. “You didn’t let me down. You didn’t let me down or Kanan or anyone else. These things,” he motioned with his glass as if to indicate the Dreams and their chaos, “fucking happen. They happen all the time. Every month it’s something new. If we went ‘round blamin’ ourselves for shit outta our control, we’d drive ourselves insane…” his eyes fell on the glass in his hands, “in some cases more insane….” He trailed a moment as if lost in his own thoughts. Then his eyes moved back up to Katou. “I got myself wrapped up in that fucking game. You didn’t make me play it.” He grunted. “Not like it was the first time I had something unwanted in my fucking head.”
Wash drained the rest of his glass in a few gulps. The shots Katou had arrived and Wash helped himself to one of them. “The point,” he said before raising the glass to his lips, “is that I shoulda known better. A free game bein’ handed out by some unknown developer? Fuck.” The shot went down and the glass turned upside down to join it’s compatriot at the side of the table, lined up perfectly as a testament to Wash’s desire to have everything in its place. “By rights you should be pissed at me for letting myself get possessed in the first place and then being absolutely fucking useless in the few hours I wasn’t.”
Katou stared, a little taken aback by Wash’s outburst. Then, unexpectedly, he burst out laughing. “Jesus Christ, Hyde,” he managed between the laughter. “If you're going to tell me this wasn’t my fault when I literally left a weapon that could end the world under my bed for two years, then you sure as shit can't go around blaming yourself for playing a fucking video game.”
He didn't really buy what Wash was selling - he knew all of it was his fault. Those murder victims had been killed by his cross rod. Rociel was a monster that had come from his dreams. And for the cherry on top of the shit sundae, it had been Katou in the end who had hatched the Egg, not Rociel at all. But he’d let it drop if it meant he didn’t have to hear Wash claim that something was his fault when it wasn’t.
“Hey man, if you want me to catch up, you’re going to have to slow down,” he pointed out. He downed his shot, and then followed it by chugging down the rest of his beer. He let out a loud belch, and added “I’m not a fucking camel you know.”
Wash stared at him. He had never asked Katou how the Egg had been stolen and quite frankly at the time it hadn’t really mattered. All that was important was that they found it again. But hearing that Katou had been keeping the thing under his bed….
Wash laughed. “Are you shitting me?” He shook his head. “Under your bed. Jesus, man.” He waved the waitress over for another round. He had no intention of slowing down. Not now. Not until he could no longer see straight and then some. Katou was just going to have to drink faster. “Though, I guess...to be fair...under the bed is as good a place as any place else. There’s nuthin’ sayin’ that Rociel wouldn’t have found it if you’d put it anywhere else. I mean nothing short of locking it up in Fort Fucking Knox wouldn’t have kept’im away. An’ even then...” He shrugged.
Wash wasn’t really buying what Katou was selling either. It may have been true that if Katou had put the egg somewhere safer Rociel may not have found it. It also may not have been. Wash had the guy in his head. In his opinion it only would have been a matter of time before he’d found the Egg no matter where Katou had decided to stash it.
What bothered Wash was the fact that Katou had come to him looking for help and Wash had let him down. Repeatedly. He’d gotten sober for the express purpose of being able to be there for when his friends needed him. And he couldn’t even get that right. So what was the point?
Wash picked up the fresh beer that had been put in front of him. “I’m not slowin’ down,” he said. “Not ‘til I’m dead. So, you just hafta drink faster.”
Katou almost wilted under Wash’s stare, convinced that he was going to blame Katou too, just like everyone else did. Not that they didn’t have every right to do it. But then Wash laughed, and Katou relaxed.
“Probably woulda been safer in the Agency’s vault,” Katou said. He waffled for a moment, not sure if he should tell Wash the rest. That he wasn’t sure if Rociel would have had enough astral energy to hatch the Egg if Katou hadn’t poured every ounce of energy he had into destroying Rociel, and had caught the egg up in it.
But then the waitress was there again, and he didn’t have to worry about it anymore. If Wash wasn’t going to slow down, then Katou was going to have to cheat. “Another beer. And four - no, five - shots of tequila,” he said, and turned to Wash. “And none of them are for you,” he said, pointing a finger at him.
The waitress looked from him to Wash, a look of unease on her face, as though she wasn’t quite sure if she should listen to him.
Wash looked up at the waitress. “My cards at tha bar,” he reminded her. “Add it to the tab. And an additional coupla shots. Ana pitcher of this,” he tapped the top of his glass of beer.
The waitress still looked uncomfortable with the order, especially since it was becoming obvious by Wash’s formation of words that he was already on the other side of drunk, never mind that his companion barely looked old enough to drive, let alone drink. “The kitchen is still open,” she said helpfully. “Would you like to order some food?”
It may have been the waitress’s ploy to sop up some of the alcohol in their guts with some food, but actually some greasy bar food sounded pretty good to Wash’s buzzed ears. “Yeah, may as well,” he said. “Basket a wings. Fries.”
The waitress nodded and jotted down the order. She glanced at Katou again, her brows furrowed together as if in silent plea to not give themselves alcohol poisoning on her shift. Then she was gone again.
Wash watched her go, keeping an eye on her until she’d disappeared around a corner. Then he rubbed at his face tiredly and turned his attention back to Katou. He was quiet for a few moments, seemingly mulling over a few thoughts – or maybe trying to remember what they’d been talking about before the waitress had appeared.
“Good thinking, man,” Katou said. “I could really go for some wings.” Especially since they were fairly easy to eat with one hand. Fries too. Definitely beat trying to maneuver a burger or anything that required utensils.
He leaned back in the booth, beginning to feel the buzz of his chugged beer and shots. It was nice, drinking again with Wash. He wouldn’t force the guy to drink if he was gonna do the whole quitting thing, but he’d missed his drinking buddy during the time that he’d been sober. “This is nice, man,” Katou said, deciding that he’d had enough of talking about Rociel and the end of the world. Fuck that noise, he was here to have a good time with his friend, not dwell on the past. The past was the past and all that. “I missed drinking with you.”
“Yeah?” Wash raised a brow. He swirled what was left his beer around in his glass, thoughtfully. Katou may have been the only person who thought what they were doing was nice. Wash knew he couldn’t control his drinking and this would lead to nothing good.
Right now, however, Katou wanted to have a good time with his buddy and Wash wasn’t going to deny him of that. “Well, we’re makin’ up for lost time now,” he said with a smirk. “Best place for a drunk to be is in a bar, right?”
Katou knew that Wash was an alcoholic. When Wash had first quit drinking, Katou’d been supportive. But back then, he’d been over a year clean himself, and, well, he wasn’t that anymore. It wasn’t much fun falling off the wagon by yourself. Besides, there wouldn’t be anything to feel guilty about if they had fun. And besides, Katou lived by the motto no regrets. And so, it was easier to just not think about any regrets that might come from getting an alcoholic drunk.
“Maybe,” Katou said, frowning a little. “But it sure as hell ain’t the most entertaining place to be. Or the cheapest, for that matter. Whatdya say? After this round lets go out and do something.”
Wash didn’t really want to do anything but sit where he was and drink. But the buzz he was currently nursing (which was steadily becoming more than just simply buzzed) made him feel pretty good. Why shouldn’t they go do something. Wash had no idea what that something was, but Katou was a smart guy. He’d come up with something.
“Yeah, sure,” Wash shrugged his shoulders. “Why the hell not? Whaddya wanna do?”
Katou frowned and leaned back in the booth, drumming his fingers against the table. Plans had never been Katou’s strong suit, and he didn’t have one now. Generally, when he was feeling antsy and drunk like this, he just wandered around until something interesting popped up. But that didn’t seem like a very good pitch.
Luckily, he was saved from answering when the waitress returned and, with a bit of hesitation, put the drinks they had ordered in front of them. “Let’s brainstorm,” he said, picking up his first shot of tequila and shooting it back. “I’m thinking… beach. Sneak a couple bottles, get some sand in our boots,” he said, and then slammed back two more of the shots.
Wash snapped up one of the shots before Katou could drink them all and slammed it back. The tequila hit his stomach hard and with a small warning that he was going to pay for this the next morning. He didn’t care. That was Tomorrow Wash’s problem. Besides, it’s like he’d never nursed himself through a hangover before. So long as he showed up to work on time everything was just fine.
He chased the shot with what remained of his beer and mulled over Katou’s suggestion of the beach. Not a bad idea. This time of night the beach would be mostly deserted and quiet. And all things considered, Wash liked the ocean. There was something about the sounds of waves that was calming. To his drunk mind the beach sounded good and he couldn’t think of anything else. “Beach works for me,” he said with a nod.
Katou scowled a little when Wash took one of the shots, but decided that it probably wasn’t worth starting shit over. Wash probably needed it more than Katou did anyway, after having Rociel in his head, and Katou owed him.
He grinned a little, and then waved the trepidatious waitress over. “Hey, we’re gonna be getting outta your hair in a little bit here,” he said cheerily. “So if you wanted to get that food of ours boxed up instead and tell us what we owe ya, we’ll fuck off.” He probably should’ve been a little offended at the relief on her face.