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Matsuda isn’t sure where Hajime Hinata's screams begin, and where Izuru Kamukura’s screams end.
It’s been a while since he’s heard them, granted. Sometime ago, a shift he can’t put his finger on, from the boy who’d walked into his lab, to the creature that sits there now.
Squatting on the bed, hunched over himself on all four limbs- Kamukura gets like this, coming down from anesthesia. He’ll blearily open his eyes, take in his surroundings, and the moment the iciness in his veins wears away enough for him to register the gravity of it all, he pulls himself up and away. A scramble uncoordinated of limbs and fresh stitches, he tugs and tangles the IV line and wires as he goes, pulling an irritated sigh out of Matsuda.
“Oi! We go over this every time-“ he tries to explain as he takes a cautious step closer, but really it’s no use. Kamukura tenses at the approach, fleeing the bed and knocking over a wheeling cart and the tray of medical instruments atop it as he does. Matsuda’s curse is barely audible over the metal clattering to the floor.
“Bastard,” he grits his teeth, thankful he’d had the sense to detach the electrodes from Kamukura’s head beforehand. “This equipment is expensive!”
That complaint feels more empty though, and he swallows thickly at it- for all that Hope’s Peak had promised to fund him, had he agreed to participate in this fucked up little experiment of theirs, he has no right to be complaining about a lack of lab equipment.
Not like it’s any more expensive than all the money they’re pouring into this… into this thing in front of him.
“Humanity’s hope,” he snorts, rolls his eyes. The syringe feels oddly heavy as he picks it up.
Does that really justify it? Playing God? The self assigned right to reduce a perfectly functional, albeit talentless human, into this?
Turning his eye to the corner of the room where Kamukura has retreated, Matsuda feels the frown on his face increase twofold. It’s hard to picture what the end product of all this is supposed to be, when he’s staring down at Kamukura, hands and feet planted on the cold tile like some kind of gargoyle, red eyes pinned to him behind the heavy veil of his hair, every limb tense and prepared to bolt.
Doesn’t speak. The most Matsuda thinks he’s heard out of Kamukura besides screams behind plexiglass is the occasional growl, and the sharp inhale of breath he takes as Matsuda once again tries to approach.
This time though, he lowers himself slightly, and briefly thinks to complain that they could never compensate him enough for this. To placate a wounded animal, to be bitten so many times the teeth marks may as well be permanently marred into his skin.
Though he isn’t sure he could expect anything else from someone whose neurons have been reformed by an imperfect hand, a mind too big for its body, it’s still hard not to be frustrated.
Eyes flitting across the space to take everything in, to do what he can to lure Kamukura back, Matsuda spots the steadily growing blood stain, now blooming across the pale blue of Kamukura’s hospital gown.
“For the love of-“ he mutters, vexation creeping into his words like poison. He squats to meet Kamukura’s level, a good few feet of space between them, and he tries to beckon the other closer with his empty hand, though the gesture comes off much too aggressive. “You can’t keep pulling your fucking stitches. They’ll have my ass if it gets infected. Do you understand?”
As always, Kamukura meets him only with a stare.
“Ungrateful cunt,” Matsuda scoots just a bit closer. “Don’t know why I do this for you.”
And really, he doesn’t. Because it always ends the same. Ends with his words falling on deaf ears, a scramble, his hands twisting into Kamukura’s hair to hold him in place as he drives the needle into Kamukura’s skin and Kamukura’s teeth sink into his flesh.
Could it ever be anything else?
As if thinking the same thing, Matsuda notices that Kamukura’s eyes have fallen to focus on the sedative in his hand, glaring at it on high alert.
And Matsuda wonders if he’s truly lost it, when after a moment's contemplation, he lets the needle go.
Makes a show of rolling it away, with a mutter of “look.” Holds his empty hands up with a flourish. Thinks that if Kamukura we’re capable of being confused, that’s precisely the emotion that flashes over his face.
It’s barely visible, peeking out through the limp strands of hair caked in grease that obscure his view, but just for a second, it’s there.
Tension hangs heavy in the air between them, and with every second that passes, Matsuda realizes just how stupid his choice may have been. Because for all that Kamukura likes to lunge himself, Matsuda has always had the power of a needle to put him down, and not without a fight first, because Kamukura is strong. The sort of strength that comes with unbridled self preservation, frantic and feral and desperate, and just as his fingers are about to twitch, to retract his idiocracy and scramble for the syringe again, he feels the brunt of Kamukura’s stare physically soften.
Then Kamukura folds.
He lowers his head, the nape of his neck exposed as he bows and it strikes Matsuda how defenseless he’s choosing to render himself. How he crumbles, eyes still pinned on Matsuda to track his every moment, but makes no move to flee as Matsuda closes the gap between them.
It’s slow going, careful not to startle, and Matsuda’s heart is beating up into his throat, but finally he crosses the stretch, and lets out a breath when he’s close enough to feel the warmth radiating off of Kamukura’s skin.
“So you are capable of reason,” Matsuda bristles. “Or maybe you just like being a pain in my ass.”
He lifts his hand in full view of Kamukura, hovers there, letting him see it, and when no protest is given, he moves to assess the full extent of Kamukura’s bleeding.
It’s not as bad as it could be. But it’s bad enough there’s any bleeding at all.
Those eyes are heavy on him as he works. Observing, cautious, unsettling. He’s grown used to the weight of it along with his sins by now, the constant glare coming from the corners of the room Kamukura likes to lurk in, the endless sensation of eyes on the back of his head.
Really though, Matsuda isn’t sure where Hajime Hinata's stare begins, and where Izuru Kamukura’s stare ends.