Work Text:
“Who the hell is it this time?” Iruma spat, despite no one else having come to see her all day.
Turing toward the source of the distraction, screwdriver brandished, she discovered the metallic face of Kiibo smiling in doorway to her lab.
“Ah, excuse me, Iruma-san. I didn’t mean to interrupt your important work.”
“ ’S no big,” she replied, scratching the tip of her nose with the tool. In truth, she had done little more than twirl the screwdriver between her fingers for the better part of an hour, something of an invertor’s block having overtaken her. “As long as you realise how important I am and shit.”
“Oh yes!” Kiibo replied emphatically. “Without you, I’m not sure how I’d manage.”
“Well, you’re sure as shit not wrong about that,” Iruma replied, standing from her workbench in order to look the robot up and down. “Whoever made you did a pretty crappy job, if something new keeps crapping out on you every time I turn around. So what’s the problem this time?”
Kiibo held out his left arm for her to see, flexing it in demonstration. It was clear right away that it bent far too easily now, like the arm of a ragdoll. “It would seem that a screw has come lose in my elbow.”
“Is that all?” Although Iruma feigned dissapointment, even someone as less-than-traditionally human as Kiibo could see through it- her eyes sparkled the same way they always did when given a chance to work on him. “The Great Iruma could fix that in her sleep.”
Kiibo blinked. “Then perhaps, would it be for the best if we were to share a room? Then you could repair me in your sleep after all, rather than spend your valuable inventing time on me.”
The inventor nearly dropped her tool. “S-share a room? Like in the same bed…or…?” Iruma cleared her throat, forcing her mind to switch gears. If her hands got too sweaty, it might be hard to keep hold of the screwdriver. Still… it wasn’t such a bad idea. An invention that would allow her to invent in her sleep? She might just have to get on that… After fixing Kiibo, of course. He certainly was keeping her busy these days. “You have some damn good ideas, you know that?”
“Oh…? Do I?” Kiibo asked, glancing downward toward Iruma’s hands where his damaged arm now rested in them.
Iruma snorted. So he could ask to sleep in the same room as a girl like it was nothing, yet taking a compliment was a big whoop? He was adorable…although maybe just a touch too innocent for her taste.
A chill ran down her spine as she ran her fingers over the steel limb. For being metal, Kiibo’s body was always delightfully warm, and so smooth. Shiny and streamlined…
“Um…” Kiibo began, snapping Iruma’s attention back toward his now expectant face. Her own had a bit of drool beginning to escape toward her chin, she realised, wiping at it hastily with her sleeve. “Should I bring my things over tonight?”
“Your what?” Had Kiibo been a flesh-and-blood human, her sudden grip on his wrist might have hurt. “No! Holy shit. That…that wasn’t what I meant, damnit! You just…gave me a good idea for a new invention. ‘S all.”
“Please forgive me, then.” Kiibo’s utterly deflated look had Iruma suddenly feeling as if the screwdriver had stabbed directly into her heart.
The repair was just as simple as it had looked, and Iruma had the screw tightened back up in no time.
“Thank you again, Iruma-san,” Kiibo said on his way out.
Once out into the hall, Kiibo began to rub at his newly repaired arm. Although it was only a simple repair, Iruma had done a superb job on it, the replacement screw tightened to perfection, allowing for optimal range of motion. Even if he were to damage something more complex the next time, he had no doubt that the inventor would have no problem fixing it.
It wasn’t bad of him if she enjoyed herself so much, right?
It really had been an accident, the very first time. Ouma had been picking on him again, causing him to become distracted and trip over one of the plant roots growing up from the floor. He had felt a worrying snap somewhere inside of his torso as he tried to get up.
For being on the brash side personality-wise, Iruma’s hands were surprisingly gentle as they worked inside of him, sorting through wires with care as if she were brushing aside windblown hairs, until she came across the two snapped ends.
She had seemed so happy then, her face flushed pink and beaming in triumph as she scrambled for her soldering tools.
Kiibo had wanted to see her that happy again as soon as he could, wanted to feel her touch more and more.
A wire crossed here, a ding there…an arm mysteriously coming off at the shoulder…
“How the hell’d you manage this?” Iruma asked, waving the arm around as it were a foam finger at a particularly heated sporting event.
“These things happen,” he replied chipperly. It wasn’t untrue.
“Look,” Iruma said, placing the arm down on her worktable, and fixing Kiibo with an intense expression. If he had had a human stomach, it would have dropped. This was not Iruma’s usual expression at all when they spent time together. “You keep praising the fuck out of my work on you, so you know that the Great Iruma isn’t stupid, right?”
“Right.”
“So why the fuck do you keep breaking yourself, then acting like you don’t think I get it? You got some kind of shitty goddamn death wish or something? …Because I’d kinda miss you…a little,” she finished weakly, the corners of her eyes shimmering in a different way then they usually did during repair work.
The robot shook his head furiously. “No! Not at all! If I were to die, then I couldn’t see Iruma-san anymore!”
“Oh…” There was flush in her cheeks again, the same color as her clothing. ‘Pretty’, Kiibo thought as he felt a wave a relief. “Is that so... Why the hell then?”
“I just wanted to spend time with you!” Kiibo replied earnestly.
Iruma rolled her eyes, breathing a heavy sigh that Kiibo couldn’t quite discern from frustration or relief. “You could’ve just asked! I fucking love working on you, idiot!”
“…’Love’?” the robot repeated, testing the word as if Iruma had just fixed him a new tongue. “I love you too, Iruma-san!
Kiibo caught a glimpse of crimson on the girl’s cheeks, right before her hands flew up to cover her face. “…Well shit.”