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Saejima came as soon as he heard. He was rumpled and sleep deprived when he landed, and Kamurocho looked just as exhausted and ruined. He was almost disappointed he’d apparently missed all the “fun.”
He was not expecting Kiryu to open the door when he arrived at the penthouse and started digging in his pockets and bag for his key. He looked pretty harried, too - deep circles under his eyes, bruises mottling his neck and jaw, one arm bandaged.
“What the hell happened,” he said, gripping his other arm.
“...long story. Come in.”
The penthouse looked like a bomb had gone off in it. The TV was exploded in broken glass and soot against the wall. Bookshelves were broken and lopsided, half empty where Kiryu had already cleaned out any damaged item. It was dim, with only one out of three of those fancy Italian glass lamps Majima liked still working.
“Is he okay? Daigo said…”
Kiryu sighed. “He’ll be fine. He just had...he did too much with a pretty bad fever and it spiked.” He glanced at him cautiously, as if he was wondering how much he could tell him.
Saejima sighed. “What else is new. He in his room?”
“Kyoudaaaaaaaaaiiii….” came the hoarse whine from the bedroom, answering his question.
Majima was buried in pillows and blankets, hair greasy and sticking to his sweaty face. He was so pale, like they’d drawn all his blood. But it'd been zombies, not vampires, right?
“Yer baaaack,” he singsang, his eye bloodshot and unfocused. Saejima took his extended hand, wrapped in clean bandages, and kissed his scuffed knuckles.
“I am. They told me ya ate shit and I had to see it.”
“I did not eat shit. I fought a big-ass rock monster, and, and a big bug with yer loan shark friend, and....”
“Ya did great.” He pressed his lips to his forehead and he almost burned himself.
“I thought I was gonna turn into a zombie,” stage-whispered Majima, like a kid telling a secret.
“Huh huh.”
“No really! I thought I was gonna have Kiryu-chan blow my head off. Did you know he had a sniper rifle? What’s he gonna do with that? He ain’t ever shot a regular gun…” he trailed off, lashes fluttering, and then he went quiet, his grip loose in Saejima’s. “Sorry…”
“Fer what? Ya did good. Just rest and recover.”
Majima was already asleep. Saejima carefully tucked his hand at his side, and went looking for Kiryu, and answers.
***
Kiryu was clearing up what remained of the TV, a charred husk stained in what looked suspiciously like blood.
“What the hell happened,” he said again, crouching down to help, picking off the glass and melted plastic chunks dusting the carpet. Carpet had to get changed too. Lots of uncomfortably human shaped stains on it.
“I know this is gonna sound insane, but it really was like one of his movies. Zombies. Dead people getting up and trying to bite and tear you apart. And...other stuff. Monsters. Mutants.”
Saejima stared. “Really.”
“Really.”
Kiryu was incapable of lying, and while gullible, he had this haunted look in his eyes. Whatever the shit that’d invaded Kamurocho was, it had to be reasonably close to zombies. And mutants.
Which meant…”did ya really have a gun?”
Kiryu nodded.
“Shot anybody?”
His mouth was a tight, drawn line, his eyebrows touching. He didn’t stop cleaning, not even when his finger beaded with blood handling a glass shard.. “I had no choice. Or at least they said I didn’t. I tried not to. They figured out a cure after the commotion was over, so…I hope some of them survived.”
Saejima gripped his shoulder. “Ya did what ya had to do.”
“I guess.”
It was probably best to change topic. “And what’s this about Majima turnin’ zombie? Did he get frisky with a zombie. Be honest with me.”
Kiryu snorted. “No, he...he got bitten by one. When I met him he was alone...he’d gotten everybody in the Hills safe in Purgatory and stayed behind.”
“Fuckin’ typical.”
“He probably won’t tell you that. I hear he went into the quarantine zone a lot to help people.”
Saejima smiled. “I’ll be sure to embarrass him with that when he feels better.”
Kiryu finally smiled back, packing all the broken glass and burned electronics into a plastic bag.
“Ya okay?” asked Saejima when he got up to add it to the already towering pile of garbage bags full of, presumably, more debris of their apartment.
“I will be,” sighed Kiryu. “If nothing else, I found out that…”
He didn’t get to finish the sentence. Majima stumbled into the living room half naked, and before Saejima could even get to his feet, Kiryu was at his side, steadying him.
“m’ fine, m’ fine,” mumbled Majima, accepting the hand holding his elbow in a way that made it very clear he wasn’t fine. “Jus’ goin’ for a piss. Unless ya wanna follow me there too?”
Kiryu blushed, and Majima laughed, wobbling to the bathroom. He was in there for a while, water running, and when he came out his hair was wet, and his eye a lot clearer.
“I’m startin’ to feel better,” he announced. “We got any food in the house?”
“I can make something,” said Kiryu immediately. He really was a dad in all of his reactions.
Majima curled up on the couch, pulling a blanket over himself, and shot Saejima the most pitiful “I’m sick and you must cuddle me” look he could muster.
Saejima sat by him and hoisted him up halfway onto his lap. He was still warm, and sniffling, and shuffling around more than usual, but he did seem more alert.
“Looks like somebody made a big mess of our TV.”
“I mighta shot it. Ya know how it is.”
“I don’t but I’ll take yer word for it.”
“‘s okay. I don’t really feel in the mood for movies. Maybe not for a while.”
Saejima rubbed circles into his undercut. He was acting nonchalant, but Saejima knew when his bro was shaken, all too well. “Ya lose many guys?”
He shook his head into his shirt. “Nah. A couple. They got in trouble like the dumbasses they are.”
“And ya had to go rescue them?”
Majima made an annoyed noise.
“Ya did good.”
The annoyed noise was even higher this time. “Made a friend tho! Hostess gal. We gotta go out for drinks when I feel better, you’re gonna love her. She has a cat.”
“Nice.”
“We should get a cat. They’re pretty cute.”
“Sure. Ain’tcha allergic though?”
“Ah, shit.” He couldn’t see him, but he could hear him, pouting. “Do they make cats with no hair?”
“They do,” said Kiryu, walking back into the room with a plate piled high with sandwiches. “But they will still give you a reaction. It’s not the fur, it’s something in their mouth when they groom themselves. There are hypoallergenic breeds, though.” He blushed when they both looked at him. “One of my kids is allergic to cats. They wanted one, so I researched. Hypoallergenic breeds are very expensive.”
“Good thing we’re loaded, huh bro?” said Majima, and Saejima knew he was absolutely gonna buy Kiryu a fancy purebred cat. He didn’t mind the idea of having a kitty around the apartment, though.
“Well, I’m done here. If you don’t need anything else, niisan, I…”
Majima pulled the pathetic sickly look on him. “Do ya need to go?”
Kiryu hesitated. “Well…”
Saejima did not expect Majima to cling to Kiryu’s pant leg like a little kid. Whatever happened between them, it must’ve been serious.
“I guess Haruka can stay with Saya and Date another night. She’ll be happy to get to visit Ryuji tomorrow too.”
“Took a shine on him, huh?”
“You could say that.” He rolled down his sleeves, and sat on the other side of Majima’s lump of sniffles. “She always liked him, even...you know.”
“Mmmh. Crazy times, those.”
Saejima caught a weird glance between but didn’t ask. Maybe one day. There was so much of Majima’s life he hadn’t been there for, and only so much time they were willing to spend in the past. He was at least glad that in those crazy times, Kiryu was there for him.
They ate their sandwiches while they both attempted to catch him up on the insane shit that’d gone down while he was away. It really was hard to believe - giant monsters, zombie serum that made people horny, the Tojo working with the army, knocking grenades into mutated giant pillbugs. And a guy both Kiryu and Majima and thought dead but wasn’t, and had a gun arm? And made takoyaki? The petty clan squabbles and Haruka getting kidnapped seemed pretty mundane in light of all that.
“So how come ya didn’t turn zombie?” he asked, petting Majima’s bandaged arm slung over his legs.
“Got bit with dentures.”
“I’m sorry?”
“The fucker who bit me was some old man? He had dentures. I don’t really know how the infection spread, but apparently that was enough. I felt terrible but it was just…” he trailed off.
“Was just what?”
“Allergies,” chimed in Kiryu. “They found him in the baths trying to sweat out the zombie virus -”
“-which woulda worked, mind ya -”
“- and it turned out he was just congested and running a pretty high fever. When they called me and told me he was in the hospital my heart almost stopped.”
“Mm. Ran in still covered in monster goo, lookin like fuckin’ Bruce Campbell at the end of Army of Darkness. Best sight I’d had all day.”
“Ya always did have a crush on Ash,” agreed Saejima.
Eventually Majima dozed off, running warm again, still mumbling about how cool Kiryu-chan looked with a rifle strapped to his back, and their hands touched briefly as they both pet him over the blanket.
“When I found him…” said Kiryu quietly, “he looked bad. Like he’d given up. He asked me...to kill him, if he really did turn.”
“Ah.”
“I...would have done it, if I had to. But....” He looked down at Majima’s curled, quietly wheezing form. “I was scared. I kept thinking of what I was going to tell you.”
Saejima put his hand over Kiryu’s on Majima’s shoulder. “I’m happy he got to say goodbye to ya. We both know it could end at any time. But with you…” He shrugged, not sure how to get it across. “...yer special to him.”
Kiryu nodded. “He’s special to me too,” he whispered. “You both are.”
“Are ya two gonna kiss any time this century or what? I gotta piss!” Majima squirmed himself onto his back, looking at them expectantly. “Ah, forget it,” he grumbled when they didn’t move, and rolled off the couch, dragging the blanket with him to the bathroom like a slug’s trail.
“Uh,” said Saejima intelligently, suddenly extremely aware of Kiryu’s hand still in his, and his heartbeat pulsing in the hollow of his throat, and the quick glance he shot at his mouth, before lowering his eyes.
“Y-yeah. Anyway.” He took his hand back. His lashes fluttered, dark, on his bruised cheek. Saejima swallowed. The toilet flushed loudly, and they both jumped.
“I am still sick,” announced Majima, and promptly sneezed to punctuate his point, “and the only cure is fallin’ asleep between two beefcakes.”
“Is that yer professional opinion?” Laughed Saejima, getting off the couch, ignoring the pins and needles in his thighs.
“Yes. Very professional. Very effective. I almost croaked, and I deserve it.”
“He does have a point,” said Kiryu, hesitantly getting up to follow them to the bedroom. In any other situation, he’d have tried to be noble and step back. He must’ve been really scared of losing him. “We can’t risk his health like this.”
Just as Majima dragged his feet and blanket into the bedroom, Saejima held Kiryu back by the wrist.
There was a faint pink blush on his tanned skin. Kissing him was so easy, even if his heart was thundering in his ears. Kiryu responded instantly, shaky fingers threading his hair and soft lips parting, as if he’d been waiting for this as long as Majima had. As long as Saejima had, if he was gonna be honest with himself for a minute.
“Now’s not the time,” he breathed on Kiryu’s plush, plush lips. “But before ya go back to Okinawa...we should probably talk this out.”
“Yeah,” he said on his mouth. “Yeah. I would like that.”
When they walked into the bedroom, Majima was trying to change the sheets, or at least had tried, got dizzy, and was now lying face down on the half unmade bed.
“What were ya even tryin’ to do.”
“It was stinky. I’ve been sweatin’ like a pig in mud for three days in here.”
Saejima hoisted him back to his feet and patted the small of his back. “Go take yer meds or somethin’. And drink some water!” he called after him.
“Yes mooooom.”
He changed the sheets quickly with fresh ones. Exhaustion and the aftermath of anxiety were starting to weight a ton, and shrugging off his sweater and pants and lying down on the expensive cotton felt really great. Especially when his kyoudai snuggled in, warm and a bit smelly but safe and alive, his breath whistling wetly against his throat.
Then the bed dipped again, and Kiryu was now tentatively curling around Majima’s back, slinging a tender arm over his hip. Saejima twined his fingers with Kiryu’s loose ones, put his arm under Majima’s head, and sighed.
“This is real nice,” muttered Majima, unfurling and stretching and getting comfortable like a cat in a sunbeam. “We should do this more often. Not just when one o’ us almost dies.”
“Agreed.”
Kiryu muttered agreement as well, and from Majima’s shiver he must’ve done it directly against his undercut. They both knew the map of his exceptional body like a second nature, an extension of their own. He didn’t want to think that he almost lost all of this.
“‘m glad I didn’t get zombified.”
“No shit.”
He put his hand over his and Kiryu’s, slipping long fingers between theirs. “It’s good to know that...if I’m the first to go, you’ll take care of each other.”
“Kyoudai.”
Kiryu tightened his grip on their fingers.
“Like ya haven’t thought about it.”
Well, he weren’t wrong. “Fair.”
“You should also consider not trying to be an action hero next time,” grumbled Kiryu.
“Look who’s talkin’.”
Kiryu made an annoyed grunt, and Majima yipped.
“He bit me! Kyoudai, Kiryu-chan bit me!”
“Good,” he laughed. “Maybe he’ll infect ya with some common sense for once.”
“I am bein’ slandered! And harassed! While sick! In my own bed! Unbelievable!” His laughter turned into an intense coughing fit that left him hissing and boneless. “How cruel…”
They both held him a little closer until he was breathing normally, the edges between them becoming fuzzy in the darkness, Kiryu’s hair soft and silky through Saejima’s fingers, their knees bumping together as they tangled their legs with Majima’s long ones.
“Actually, ya know who becomes a dashin’ action hero if ya put some zombie fire to his buns? Our lil chairman! Ya shoulda seen him...” Majima yawned. “All cocked shotgun an’...an’ one-liners…”
Saejima smiled, his tongue getting as heavy as Majima was in his arms, too heavy to ask how did that even happen. It was gonna have to wait till tomorrow.
It was good to be home.