Work Text:
"I have to help? Seriously?"
Tired of his persistent whining, Nikki only rolled her eyes as she dropped the basket of laundry into the mentalist’s arms. “You’re the one who followed us out here in the first place Gen. If all you wanna do is talk, you might as well help us out.”
The bi-colored male gave another small whine even as the village priestess nudged his arm with her own. "Come on Gen! I'm sure if we all work together, we can get it done faster!"
Defeated by the blonde's overwhelming positivity, the male could do nothing but give a defeated sigh as he followed the group to the makeshift clotheslines.
It was another laborious day for everyone in the Kingdom of Science. In an effort to improve communication around the mainland, Senku had ordered for the construction of additional radio towers in the areas where people frequented, such as the crop fields and the area that was once known as the Kingdom of Might.
When Gen had heard of the project he wasn’t too worried about being called on to help. Senku was aware that heavy, physical work did not suit Gen and instead put him in charge of smaller projects that required someone with nimble and skilled hands. As much as the mentalist would complain about making countless of batteries and wires, he would rather do that type of tedious work anyday over carrying heavy materials. With this in mind, the subject of radio towers hadn’t been an issue until he had been told that the construction would be overlooked by Kaseki.
It wasn't like he disliked the elder, in fact, he was rather fond of the old man's quirky ways. But for some reason, it definitely seemed like he had it out for Gen. Any time a labor related project came up, Gen would be the first person Kaseki would drag over to help. The old man knew and had witnessed the mentalist’s inability to carry anything heavier than a few pounds, but this apparently did not stop him from calling for the younger man’s help.
Knowing that he only had mere moments to hide before Kaseki showed up to drag him away, Gen had run off to join the group of women who had left the village a few seconds earlier.
“There girls are too damn fast.” Gen huffed as he watched Nikki, Yuzuriha and even the delicate Ruri string up clothes on the lines with the speed of a machine. Nikki had been nice enough to hand him a lighter load that consisted of blankets, but hanging them up to dry wasn’t as easy as he expected when the breeze constantly threatened to blow them away.
Another curse escaped his lips as the pins came loose on a previously hung blanket and he had to quickly catch it before it hit the floor. Behind him, a soft voice called out.
“Gen? Do you want me to help you?”
The male in question turned around to see Yuzuriha with an already empty basket in her hands, a telling sign that she was done with her part. Faux tears welled up in his eyes, “Yes please.”
The girl set her basket down before grabbing the blanket Gen had just saved a few seconds earlier. “I’ll grab one end and you can grab the other so we can pin the blanket on the clothesline. The wind is a bit stronger than usual, so don’t feel bad about struggling, I had some trouble too.”
As Yuzuriha softly giggled after her own comment, Gen shifted his eyes to look at the perfect line of clothes that the seamstress had set up. She had been the quickest to finish out of all of them, “What exactly did she have trouble with?” he thought.
With the help of an additional person, Gen had found hanging up the blankets to dry a much easier process. A comfortable silence filled the space between the two as they kept up the brisk work with an occasional hum from the male. It wasn’t until they were halfway into the job that the mentalist realized that he had never spent this much time alone with the seamstress. In fact, had he ever had an actual conversation with her outside of normal pleasantries and small talk? The more he thought about it, the more the realization bothered Gen. Considering the fact that she was best friends with his boyfriend, surely they would have talked on a deeper level by now.
"Hey Yuzuriha-chan~" He spoke up in a cheeky tone. "I hope I'm not being too nosy, but how are things between you and Taiju-kun? Now that you're both officially dating and all?"
As expected, the girl's face turned bright red and her regular smile was exchanged for a nervous one. It was obvious that she was still unused to the idea of dating her long time crush.
"T-things are going just fine! I-I mean- everything is pretty much the same as before, except that we now hold hands sometimes-"
A satisfied grin creeped up on Gen's face as he watched the girl only get more flustered. Teasing innocent couples had always been fun.
"That's about the same thing Senku told me." He nodded. "You two had always been lovebirds even before the petrification event. So when can we expect the wedding?"
"WEDDING!?" She shrieked.
The response would have been enough to make Gen burst into laughter if it wasn't for the fact that in her state of shock, the blanket had slipped from her grasp and was now in danger of flying away. Noticing that the male was having trouble holding onto the blanket, Yuzuriha was quick to snap out of her embarrassment and grabbed hold of the sheet once again as the wind picked up.
Gen gave a small chuckle as they both made quick work of fastening the item onto the clothesline. "That was mean of me, sorry Yuzuriha-chan~"
The girl responded with a shake of her head despite the color still remaining on her cheeks. "No, it's fine. I knew you were joking but it still caught me off guard. But if we're talking about dating, I do have a question of my own."
Gen raised an eyebrow in curiosity as they both hung up the next blanket. "Oh? And what would that be?"
An expression of uncertainty overtook the girl's previously shocked face. "You don't have to answer if you don't want to, but how long have you and Senku been dating?” There was a tiny pause before she quickly elaborated as to not seem rude, “I mean- Taiju and I picked up on the subtle ways Senku treated you differently than everybody else, so we suspected that he had taken a liking to you. But a few days ago when we finally asked him about it, he straight up told us that you two were dating. It really caught us off guard I guess."
The mentalist laughed as Yuzuriha finished recounting her story. "He didn't even tell his best friends? I thought you guys already knew!"
She gave a soft laugh and shook her head once more. "It wasn't like he was trying to keep it a secret. He just didn't say anything because we never asked.."
"Ah, that definitely sounds like something Senku-chan would say." Gen smirked. "But to answer your question, we've been dating for quite a while now."
They moved onto the next blanket as he continued speaking. "We had been flirting for a long while before we made it official, or rather, he made it official. Senku-chan didn't exactly ask me, he kinda just stated that we were going out and I went along with the idea since I didn't have a problem with it."
At hearing this, the short haired girl couldn't help but laugh. "That sounds like something Senku would do. He's never been the type to beat around the bush."
"Senku-chan hates anything that is sappy or romantic, but would it have killed him to make the moment a bit more special?" Gen dramatically sighed but the small grin on his face betrayed his words.
This time a laugh erupted from the two and they had to take a quick pause before getting back to work on the few blankets that were still left.
"But still, I'm very glad Senku has someone by his side." Yuzuriha smiled. "He isn't the most open person out there, so I can understand why some people find it hard to get along with him. I was honestly worried when I heard he was dating, but now that I know it's you, it seems that I was worried over nothing."
Gen's grin slightly faltered, "What exactly makes you so relieved? Not many people would be happy to find out their friend was dating a shallow man like me~"
Yuzuriha maintained the soft smile on her face as she focused on the blanket they were currently putting up. "I've been watching you know. Senku is my best friend, so you could almost call it my obligation to look out for him."
The bi-colored male stopped working as he looked over at Yuzuriha. For once, he didn't know what to expect next.
"I've never seen anyone sync up so perfectly with Senku." She giggled. "As his best friends, Taiju and I have always had a better understanding of the things Senku does and why he does them, but we could never hope to work on the same level as him. But since you came along, there's finally been someone to challenge and support his ideas in ways we could never. In more ways than one, I truly believe you two are a perfect match for each other."
The atmosphere around them came to a standstill as the seamstress kept up her sincere, sweet smile and Gen was stunned into silence. He wasn’t exactly sure what he was expecting to hear. Disappointment? Anger? Maybe even a few insults? He had been ready to defend his relationship with Senku, but to hear that Yuzuriha approved made a giddy feeling rise up in his chest.
"Does this mean I don't need to steal him away? I was worried Mr. and Mrs. Oki were going to demand a dowry for their little scientist~" Gen quickly joked to make up for the minute that he had been caught off guard, and more importantly, to hide how flustered he felt.
"M-Mrs. Oki!" The girl parroted with an equally red face as before. Gen cackled once more as he watched his laundry partner work herself up once again. It wasn't until he reached over to grab another blanket that the mentalist realized that the basket was now empty.
"We've finally finished Yuzuriha-chan!"
At hearing the news, the girl blinked before peering into the basket to confirm it herself. "See, Ruri was right! Working together helped us finish much faster!"
Gen nodded before pointing over a bit of a distance away. "Speaking of, she and Nikki have been done with their own share a while now. Should we go and sit with them for a bit?”
After receiving a verbal agreement from the seamstress, the duo headed over to the others that rested under the shade of a nearby tree. Upon noticing their presence, the priestess was quick to wave them over before motioning them to sit down. “Hello again you two! It seemed like you were both having a fun discussion, can I ask what it was about?”
The mentalist simply shrugged as he took a seat next to the blue eyed blonde, “Oh, you know. Now that you’re free to marry Chrome whenever you want, we were talking about possibly introducing the marriage traditions from our times.”
“MARRIAGE!?” Ruri and Nikki gasped.
Gen couldn’t help but chuckle at the reaction but he was quick to fake innocence once Yuzuriha softly punched his arm.
After an hour of talking about random subjects, the group decided it was finally time to collect the laundry to head back.
“Will you need my help again Gen?”
The dual toned male shook his head at the seamstress’ offer. “It’s fine, I can do it myself Yuzuriha-chan, but thank you!” With a sense of renewed energy, Gen happily skipped away to the area he had been working at earlier.
As the lone male quickly took down blankets to fold them, he noticed how much easier it was to work considering the wind had died down. He was three blankets in when a voice called out to him from behind.
“So this is where you’ve been mentalist?”
Unable to mistake the newcomers voice for anyone else’s, Gen turned with a cheerful smile.
“Oh? Has Senku-chan been looking for me?~”
The scientist smirked as he approached to lessen the distance between them. “No, but Kaseki was. You totally ran off to escape work didn’t you?”
Gen dramatically gasped as he put a hand to his chest, “Are you making accusations!?”
When Senku’s grin remained unchanged, Gen dropped the facade to mirror the knowing smile he was receiving. “So what if I did? Are you going to tattle on me like a good little boy?”
The other only chuckled and shook his head. “I don’t care what you do in your free time, I’m just here to make sure you didn’t wander off and get lost in the wild. What are you doing here anyways?”
Gen shrugged as he continued to fold the blanket, “I tagged along with the girls to talk, but in exchange I had to help them with the laundryw.”
Senku raised an eyebrow, “Talk about what?”
The mentalist had to fight a growing smirk as he anticipated the reaction.
“Oh, you know. Marriage and stuff.”
There was a pause and Gen smiled as he watched Senku's face settle into a blank stare. It seemed that his brain hadn't fully registered what had been said. But the moment it did, Gen would be sure to savor the response.
However, there was no grand reaction. The scientist just blinked before he raised an eyebrow. "Marriage? Who's getting married?"
Gen blinked back before sheepishly smiling. Of course Senku would have completely evaded his expectations. "I was just joking, forget it."
"You wanna get married? Is that what you want?"
"What? No-" the mentalist shook his head. "I mean I do, but I was just joking."
"If you do, what's stopping us?"
There's another bout of silence as Gen’s brain halts and finally catches up to Senku’s words. By some miracle, Gen doesn't die as his neck practically snapped from how fast his head turned.
"W-WHAT!?"
“Pfft!-”
The composed facade finally broke and Senku shamelessly cackled after taking one look at his boyfriend's flustered, red face.
Almost immediately Gen realized that the joke had been turned against him and he couldn’t stop his blush from deepening due to the addition of embarrassment this time. He balled up the blanket he had just taken down before throwing it directly at the scientist’s face. “Senku-chan you meanie! You can't joke about stuff like that!"
Practically fuming but unable to leave his work behind, Gen picked up the laundry basket before stomping over to the opposite end of the clotheslines.
His response only made Senku laugh harder and it took a while longer for his laughter to finally subside. Once it did, the scientist wiped a tear from his eye and took a second to admire the pouting face his boyfriend was still making.
When it came to putting up fronts, Gen was damn good at his job. The mentalist prided himself in having complete control over his emotions and in return, manipulating the feelings of those around him. To Senku, this only made it more satisfying when he was able to crack through Gen’s seemingly impenetrable mask. Though he would never admit it out loud, Senku was glad he was the only one able to elicit such reactions from the bi-colored male.
After making sure to pick up the discarded blanket, the scientist waltzed over and only smirked when he noticed the frown on Gen’s face increasing the closer he got.
"Mentalist."
Senku's call was met with silence as Gen deliberately ignored him in favor of folding up more of the laundry. The childish display almost made him chuckle but he fought back the urge as he knew that it would only make the other more embarrassed.
"Gen."
This time the working male went still. Senku only ever dropped nicknames when things got serious, so hearing the scientist refer to him by his actual name must have come as a surprise.
There was a bit of hesitation before Gen turned to face the other, though by his expression it was clear that he wasn't too happy about it. Before he could ask why he had been called out to in such a way, Gen watched in surprise as Senku lifted and extended the white blanket over his two-toned head as if it were a veil.
The snarky look in Senku's eyes was replaced by a much softer gaze as he lovingly stared at Gen. "I was only half joking you know."
He leaned over to softly kiss the other on his lips and Gen did nothing except stand there like a gawking idiot. Before he could register the sudden change in personality, Senku broke the kiss before seeming to give a satisfied smirk at Gen's still shocked face.
"I'm heading back, there's still some work that needs to be done before the radio towers are ready to broadcast."
Without another word, the scientist simply turned around leaving behind a still dumbfounded Gen. It wasn’t until he was a considerable distance away that the older male broke free of his trance.
“W-WAIT SENKU!” He yelled as he frantically pulled off the blanket from the top of his head. “WHAT DOES THAT MEAN!?”
The male in question shrugged without even glancing back, “We can talk about it later when I’m not busy.”
Desperate for an answer, Gen ran off to catch up with his boyfriend leaving behind the now forgotten laundry.
“YOU CAN’T JUST SAY THAT AND WALK AWAY! WHAT DOES THAT MEAN!?”