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Takatora knew going into things that he should always be prepared for the unknown. With what his job entailed, there were bound to be many things unexpected that popped up along the way. However, this... this was not something he had ever prepared to deal with.
When he first met Ryouma, the young scientist seemed very put together. He was always very confident and proud of his work. Always seemed to know exactly what needed to be done to improve things.
So when things went wrong, things really went wrong. Ryouma had been testing out some minor things with Helheim. It hadn't ended well, unfortunately. The experiment failed and caused quite a bit of damage.
Nothing major. No one had gotten badly hurt. And it had been in Helheim so who really cared if the forest got a bit destroyed?
Ryouma had retreated from everyone once things had settled down. His head had been hung low. Takatora wasn't used to seeing him defeated like that. Sure, he had only been working with Ryouma for a few months, but he felt like he knew him quite well by now. Arguably he knew him better than he probably should for how little time they've known each other for.
Then again, this was the most major mess up he had made since they had joined forces. Maybe that had something to do with how dejected he seemed.
Takatora went after Ryouma. He wanted to make sure he was alright. He hadn't said anything about if he had been injured or not from it.
Ryouma had left quickly. Takatora had no idea where he had gone. He took a guess that he may be in his lab and went there. Perhaps he was going to look over his notes on this experiment and try to figure out what had gone wrong?
Instead of that, Takatora stumbled into a much worse scene. Ryouma had flung papers everywhere and was looking quite upset.
"You idiot! Stupid! Stupid!" He was yelling at himself, going and hitting himself as he spoke as well. "Why can't you do anything right?!"
Takatora found himself unable to move. He was stuck watching the scene unfold. He was startled too much by the sudden change in Ryouma's demeanor. He had never seen him act this way before. It was concerning.
"Why... why can't I just die...?"
Those words were enough to make Takatora move. "Ryouma."
Ryouma whipped around at the sound of his voice. It was clear that he had also been crying.
"What do you want?" Ryouma's voice was flat as he spoke.
"To make sure you're alright." Takatora stated, inviting himself into the room.
"I'm fine. Go away." Ryouma grumbled, turning away.
"You aren't fine. What's going on? Why are you so upset?" Takatora questioned, "Mistakes happen. There's no need to beat yourself up so much about it."
"I don't need your help. Leave me alone."
"Ryouma-"
"Leave me alone!" Ryouma whipped back around and snapped at him.
Takatora took a step back. "Ryouma, please. You're my friend. I don't want to see you like this."
"Then get out!" Ryouma shoved him out the door and slammed it in his face.
Takatora tried the door, but it had been locked. He could hear quiet crying on the other side. Just what was going on?
Seeing as he wasn't going to make any progress at this moment, Takatora went back to his office. He started off handling the rest of the issue and everyone's concerns over things with it. Once all of those people were satisfied, he went and looked into Ryouma's past.
He didn't find much, but he was able to get access to some older research projects he had done before they met. Unfortunately, there wasn't much he could determine from any of the data he read. There was no indication of this behavior occurring during any of these.
That just made Takatora more concerned. What if this was the first time Ryouma was acting like this? What would that mean? He really needed to get to bottom of this. He couldn't lose Ryouma. He needed him. He didn't want to lose one of his only friends. Though, to be honest, his relationship with Ryouma was not a normal friendship. They were a lot closer than most would consider normal for friends but he didn't have the time to truly unpack that right now.
...
When evening fell, Takatora took another trip up to see Ryouma. He hadn't heard from him at all since earlier. Was he still here or had he quietly left the building when no one was looking?
This time, he brought keys to the door. He hoped it wasn't still locked but he wanted to be prepared. He was getting inside that lab. Even if its inhabitant was gone for the day, maybe it held some more clues to what was going on.
The door was still locked. That didn't tell him much. He didn't bother knocking and just unlocked the door and stepped inside. The lights were still on. It didn't take much more looking to find that Ryouma hadn't left.
He was sitting at his desk, his head buried in his arms. Takatora assumed he was asleep. Should he disturb him? If he wanted to snoop, he should probably try to not wake him up. He might end up dealing with the exact same situation he had earlier today.
Takatora took a glance around the room. It was still a mess from earlier. Ryouma hadn't opted to clean it up yet. Not that his normal workspace was that organized either.
There was no way he was finding anything in this mess. The only way he was getting to the bottom of this was to talk to Ryouma. Hopefully he had calmed down enough to have a casual chat over things.
As Takatora was about to shake him awake, he paused. The sleeve to Ryouma's coat had gotten pulled up from his position. There were bandages on his arm. And there was some red on said bandages.
There was only one thing that came to mind when Takatora saw that, as much as he didn't want to think it. Ryouma hadn't been injured from the incident. He knew that much. That meant that was self-inflicted after he had left.
Takatora shook Ryouma awake. He needed to talk to him now more than ever. If he was willing to go that far from a simple accident, just what else would he do? Just what else had he done in the past too? It was only now that Takatora realized he hadn't ever seen Ryouma not in long sleeves.
"Why're you here...?" Ryouma glanced at him with tired eyes.
"Why do you think." Takatora replied. "You shouldn't sleep here."
"Leave me alone..."
"I can't."
"Yes, you can."
"But I won't."
"Why...?"
Takatora placed a hand on the exposed bandages as his answer. Ryouma didn't say anything in reply. He looked away from Takatora.
"What's wrong? Why did you feel the need to do this?" Takatora asked, "You really are overreacting to what happened. Well, to me it seems that way."
Ryouma was silent for a long time. Eventually he glanced back over at Takatora and sat up straight.
"Aren't you mad at me?"
"Why would I be mad at you? Nobody got seriously hurt. Accidents like this are bound to happen. I'm aware we will have things like this occur sometimes. It's not your fault." Takatora replied.
"But it is..."
Takatora sighed, "What scientist hasn't fucked up things before?"
"Sorry... I guess I have overreacted..." Ryouma mumbled. That wasn't something Takatora was used to hearing.
Ryouma was always so confident and, dare he say, boastful about everything. He was never one to shy away. This really was affecting him a lot then.
"Will you explain why?" Takatora questioned, "I don't want to repeat this if we can help it."
He didn't like seeing his friend this way.
"Cause... I've never been treated kindly after fucking something up." Ryouma explained quietly, "I'm supposed to be too smart for that."
Takatora sighed at his explanation. People put way too much expectations on Ryouma. Maybe he was being that way too? If Ryouma reacted like that then was that the truth? Was he putting too much pressure on him to be perfect with everything he did?
"I'm sorry if I've been making you feel pressured like that. I never intended to come off that way." Takatora apologized, "I'm not an idiot. You're only human like everyone else."
"I wish I felt human..."
"What do you... mean?"
Ryouma stared at his computer. "Everyone's always treated me as something other than human. I've never really felt like a normal person before. Because of them."
"I see..." Takatora replied, "But, you are only human. And this really proves that."
Ryouma glanced at his arm. "Are you disappointed in me?"
"No?" Takatora was confused by those words. "I'm worried about you. Knowing you'll do that... it makes me worry what could happen if this occurs again."
Ryouma let out a bitter laugh. "You're the only one who sees me as human, huh? As my own person and not your property."
"People have... treated you that way?" Takatora didn't know how to feel knowing that information.
"Of course. I'm the special one. The one they'd always want to flaunt around. Why'd they treat me as an equal?"
Takatora wasn't blind. He had seen how other leaders of different areas of Yggdrasil treated employees. He just never expected the treatment to ever get to that point.
"Without you, what good am I?" Takatora responded, "You're the one doing the hard work. If you weren't here, I'd have nothing."
"They always say it as the fact they found me so my accomplishments are theirs."
Takatora just sighed. He didn't know what to say anymore. Just how cruel could some people be? How many of these people had be met in his life and had no idea just how they treated people?
"Can I... see your arm? You should change the bandages. Blood seeped through." Takatora changed the topic.
Ryouma tensed up at his request. That told Takatora a lot. There were going to be older wounds too. This wasn't the first time.
Ryouma eventually lowered his head and held out his arm. The role of bandages was still on the desk. At least he had the supplies to treat this at hand.
Takatora cautiously rolled up Ryouma's sleeve until the bandages stopped. He slowly unwrapped them. Ryouma refused to look anywhere near him as he did so.
The damage wasn't as bad as Takatora had feared. That was something positive out of all of this. The fresh scars stood out enough against the numerous older ones. Takatora found himself frowning. It hurt to know Ryouma had done this because he felt like he couldn't be human.
"Do you have something to clean these with?" Takatora asked.
Ryouma pointed to a shelf. He had a first aid area. That was a good thing to have around.
Takatora grabbed what he needed and began cleaning the wounds. He went slow. Ryouma was wincing and flinching a bit. He didn't want to hurt him too much if he could help it.
"I'm glad you're still with us." Takatora said to try and fill the silence. "I can't imagine life without you here. You're the only friend I have that I can be less put together around."
Ryouma didn't respond, but Takatora caught a glimpse of his eyes getting watery. Takatora started wrapping fresh bandages around his arm.
"You're the only friend I have..." Ryouma whispered, almost too quiet to hear.
"I'm sorry. Life didn't deal you a very fair hand."
"Yeah." There was a weight to that reply that Takatora knew he shouldn't pry into. He could only guess just what else Ryouma had gone through that he had yet to tell him about.
"You don't need to punish yourself like this anymore. You're human. You can mess up. I don't care. I'm more worried about you being safe than what happened." Takatora stated.
Ryouma nodded.
"Now, why don't we head out? I'll walk you home."
"Will you... stay?"
Takatora didn't respond right away. He wanted to agree immediately, but wasn't sure. If anyone found out, things wouldn't end well. But, it was late. No one should see them. He should be fine.
"For one night. I'll stay." Takatora agreed.
"Thank you..."