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Chris was startled out of his reading by flashing red warning lights and blaring alarm bells echoing throughout the lab. He whirled around to find Kaito struggling to input the code to turn off the laser machine in the center of the lab.
Currently they were testing building materials for how well they could withstand large amount of Astral or Barian energy. He and Kaito had determined one of the main reasons their portal had failed to hold up long enough for Yuma to make his return trip had simply been that the materials it was fashioned from couldn’t handle the energy the Astralite’s produced for any longer.
It made sense. The Astral and Barian worlds contained so much more energy than their world, materials from their world could never keep up. So they had collected samples from the Astral and Barian worlds (with Yuma and Astral’s help, naturally) and were running tests to see how long they could maintain their structural integrity while conducting large amounts of energy.
Not an exceptionally urgent endeavor, but a practical one nonetheless. Yuma and his friends were not infrequently called to help with matters that arose in these other worlds. It made sense to have some means to support them there.
Once Kaito correctly input the code the flashing lights and alarms subsided. He huffed as he leaned his whole weight against the door to the machines’s main chamber, slowly sliding the heavy slab of metal aside. As he did so smoke began to spill out of the testing chamber, and moments later the distinct smell of burning followed it.
Kaito put his protective eye gear on, grabbed the fire extinguisher from the side of the chamber, and disappeared through the door.
Once his nerves had started to settle Chris began to wonder what had happened. The goal of the test was to mark the time when the material started to disintegrate after being hit with the laser. It should have shut off at this point, long before anything began to combust. Perhaps it wasn’t set up right? Though it was rare for Kaito to make mistakes like this.
Kaito emerged a few seconds later coughing. The sample had been rather small, so most of the smoke had already cleared. He unceremoniously dropped the fire extinguisher and his goggles on the floor, and left the lab, slamming the door behind him.
While it was far from the biggest tantrum Chris had witnessed growing up in the Arclight household, it was unusual behavior for Kaito. He wondered what was going on.
“It’s rather cold and rainy outside today, isn’t it?” Tron mused.
Chris nearly jumped again. He hadn’t noticed his father entering the room.
Tron’s tone of voice seemed rather disinterested, but Chris suspected his comment was more than an offhand observation about the weather Kaito was walking out into. Tron seemed to have a talent for finding simple ways to completely knock Chris off balance.
He couldn’t help but wonder, did Kaito’s mood have something to do with the weather?
“I’ll go check on him,” Chris said, turning to grab his coat and rushing out the door before his father could say anything else.
When he got outside it took Chris a moment to locate Kaito. He was sitting under the building’s narrow overhang a few meters away from the lab’s entrance his back pressed against the building’s facade. He looked especially… small tucked away as he was, his knees pulled in close to his chest perhaps in an effort to keep as much of himself out of the rain as possible.
Chris walked over, leaning against the building beside him.
“You aren’t really upset about the tests, are you?” He asked Kaito.
Kaito didn’t respond.
Chris exhaled slowly before sliding down the wall to join Kaito on the ground. He was immediately struck by how cold the pavement was. He could see now that Kaito’s shoes and the bottom of his pants were already wet from the rain, not fitting under the narrow overhang with the rest of him. Mentally Chris resigned himself to a similar fate as even more of his legs were left out of the overhang’s protection.
He turned to look at Kaito.
“Is it the rain?” he tried.
Kaito sighed, eyes still focused ahead somewhere across the street.
“I suppose,” he said flatly.
Chris frowned, his heart sinking. How did his father know?
“You’re not thinking of that time years ago…” he started but his voice trailed off.
Kaito finally turned to look at Chris, his eyes narrowed in confusion for a brief moment before he understood what Chris was referring to. Then his expression instantly shifted to one of anger.
“Is that why you’re out here?” He asked slowly, accusing.
“…I’m out here to check on you. It’s rather cold,” Chris said stupidly.
“You can go back inside then. This has nothing to do with you,” Kaito said, turning away from Chris once again.
This was about the point where Chris would disengage from the conversation and let him just tire himself out if he were dealing with Thomas. But that would be a different situation in many respects. Thomas would already be yelling at Chris by now for one thing.
But also, Chris knew Kaito would try harder if Christopher had been the one leaving the lab in a hurry. If he was alone in the rain.
So he tried again.
“Then why are you out here?”
No response.
“Would you at least be willing to come back inside? You’ll catch a cold if you’re out here for much longer,” Chris tried.
“You don’t get it!” Kaito hissed. “I can’t work today. I’m in so much pain from the stupid rain I can’t do anything right. I’m not going back inside.”
That… made sense. Changes in barometric pressure were known to aggravate existing joint and muscle problems. And Kaito certainly dealt with plenty of that on a regular basis still, even though he had stopped overusing his photon transformation awhile ago now. Chris felt foolish for not realizing earlier. Perhaps this was what Tron had been getting at.
“I’ll drive you home then,” Chris finally said. “Have you taken anything for the pain?”
Kaito looked over at him, more tired than angry at this point.
“What do you mean?” He asked.
“…have you taken any medication to help with the inflammation?” Chris tried again.
He hoped he hadn’t misspoken. While he considered his Japanese to be generally fine, his brothers would occasionally tease him for not understanding certain idioms or things of that nature. He had been older when their family had moved and had not spent as much time interacting with people outside their family as his brothers had.
But it could be difficult to tell with Kaito. Chris had learned many times over that his friend’s unusual upbringing had left him missing some near universal experiences. There were things he simply didn’t know or places he had never had a reason to go due to his father’s … inattentive parenting. Chris wouldn’t be entirely surprised if Kaito simply had never taken painkillers before.
“No I haven’t,” Kaito admitted.
“I see. Do you have anything at your place? If not I can pick something up on the way,” Chris continued.
Kaito frowned. “I don’t need anything like that.”
Chris raised an eyebrow.
“I would say you do. It should help at least a bit.” He paused. “Do you have a specific … concern?”
Kaito hesitated. “It’s not a concern, it’s just… I don’t know.” He exhaled sharply and leaned his head back against the building, turning his gaze up at the sky.
“I guess it just doesn’t feel right. This is the price I’m paying for taking those souls. It shouldn’t be easy,” Kaito said.
Chris sat with him in silence for a few moments as the rain continued to seep into their shoes.
“I don’t think that matters,” Chris finally admitted. “It’s not anything you wanted to do in the first place. So why is it your job to make sure you’ve paid enough of a price for it now? If you really believe in heaven and hell you can worry about that all later. You just need to live for now.”
Chris carefully got to his feet, then leaned over to offer Kaito a hand. Kaito looked him in the eyes briefly as if trying to asses his intentions. But he must have found Chris’s expression acceptable as he finally accepted his help off the ground.
“You know what, I think I’ll just take you to my place. I have medication there, and you can take a warm bath if you’d like. I know you only have a shower at your place,” Chris decided.
Kaito looked at him strangely. “You’re being … too nice. It’s strange.”
Chris laughed. “Hardly. Do you think I’m going to run all those tedious tests by myself? If you’re going to slack off today I may as well stay home and finish my book too.”
“Whatever,” Kaito said, rolling his eyes. But he continued to follow Chris to his car. Chris thought he caught a faint glimpse of him smiling.