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Mob didn't answer his call, but that was to be expected. Reigen didn't bother leaving a voicemail, just dropped the phone onto his stomach and breathed in the smell of autumn, of decaying vegetation. Continued staring up at the bright sky through the tree tops above him from his prone position.
Not a view he got all that often. He wondered why. It's not like looking up took that much effort. He tried to enjoy it as much as he could, to block out the reason for the view. Blue. Wisps of white clouds. Branches that were half bare, half covered in dying leaves, rustling in the light breeze. One fluttering down every once in a while. He knew that Mob looked at the sky all the time.
They'd worked out a system by now, he and Mob.
For all that Mob was studying in a different city, he'd learned how to teleport back when he was sixteen. Thanks - or no thanks - to Reigen himself, when he'd gotten in a particular bit of trouble with a spirit with no espers around to bail him out.
In his defense, Serizawa had the day off and it really had sounded like nothing but a creaky old house with an overly nervous owner. It wasn't, and the spirit was neither humanoid nor capable of speech, as far as he could tell, so none of his attempts to talk himself out of the situation had worked. All he could do was run, and then he couldn't.
In what he thought might be his final moments, apparently his instinct had been to call Mob. To say goodbye, to tell him how proud he was of how much he'd grown, just to hear a friendly voice one last time…he wasn't sure. He didn't have the time to figure it out and he didn't have the time to do it, the phone getting knocked out of his hand and away from his ear just as the call connected, him shouting out in both startlement and pain as the supernatural force ripped at his skin and sent him sprawling.
The next thing he knew, Mob was standing over him and the spirit was screeching as it was forced to fade away.
How did you find me? Reigen had asked later. I thought you could only locate other espers with your powers.
Sort of, Mob had responded. I can locate psychic signatures. Both espers and spirits. But espers and spirits can leave traces of their signatures on others. I can locate Tome because she was possessed by Dimple, and I can locate you because of that time I transferred my powers to you. Your signatures are obviously weaker, but you're especially easy to find despite that because I know my own power better than any other.
So that was their signal now, for actual in-the-moment emergencies. Reigen calling Mob.
What with Mob's newfound ability, they'd stopped calling each other for anything else altogether. It was either sporadic texting or Mob showing up wherever Reigen was in person.
After, of course, first checking that it would be okay, in order to avoid incidents like that one time he accidentally dropped in on Reigen during a massage appointment. At least it wasn't when he was in the shower, he supposed. Although the idea of Mob appearing fully dressed in his bathtub only to get immediately soaked was kind of hilarious.
Sure enough, it only took maybe ten or so seconds, maybe a little less, for Mob to pop up out of nowhere. A relatively long response time for him, actually. Usually he showed up in two or three. Meaning Reigen had probably pulled him out of class, which…dammit, his education was important to him, and he was struggling as it was. Tense and vigilant, he immediately zeroed in on Reigen lying on the forest floor. At the bottom of a sharp drop, covered in dirt and leaves and with one of his legs clearly broken. He should probably stop assuming that old creaky houses tend to be nothing more than just that.
In his defense, they usually were just that. And this time it was just that too. He'd just happened to…actually, he didn't know what it was that he did or what it was that ended up attacking him. One second he was walking back to the main road so he could hopefully find someone to catch a ride from, the next he was getting thrown off his feet by some invisible force, then scrambling up and sprinting with no direction in mind. Then falling. And now here he was. At least it was just his leg that was broken and not his neck, and that thing didn't seem to have followed him.
"Hey, Mob! Nice of you to drop by," Reigen greeted him with an attempted smile that probably looked more like a grimace, along with a hopefully more convincingly cheerful salute. "Think you can get rid of whatever the hell it is that's haunting this place and then get me to a hospital?" He gestured exaggeratedly down his body.
Mob didn't respond, just fixed him with an unreadable look. Then he turned around and held a hand out towards the direction Reigen had come from, up the slope. There was some kind of sound, but it was indistinct, too far away to tell what exactly it had been.
Mob always acted a little strange during these emergency calls. Closer to his younger years of being inscrutable, unemotive. Reigen could tell that they bothered him, but he didn't know why, exactly. Mob didn't complain about them anymore, hadn't in a long time, just looked tired and subdued when he showed up.
"Uh…I take it the spirit has been dealt with?" Reigen asked cautiously, when Mob didn't move for a few seconds after the noise had died down.
Mob nodded, lowering his arm.
"Do you know what it was?"
Finally Mob turned back around, his expression a little softer now. "A remnant of a wind god. But it didn't feel conscious, just…reactive. The god must have lost its power and sentience as it lost its worshippers. It's kind of sad, really. If the god had still been itself, I could have talked to it, wouldn't have had to destroy it." He tilted his head. "But then, if it had been itself it probably wouldn't have gone after you in the first place. You must have accidentally stepped on a piece of its old shrine, if you caught its attention."
His expression turned contemplative for a moment, his gaze unfocused, then he shook his head and met Reigen's eyes, before quickly shifting his attention to his leg.
"Sorry," he said, his forehead creasing. "I'll get you to a hospital right now." Then he knelt by Reigen's side, placed a hand on his arm, and in an instant they were in the ER reception area of Chamomile Hospital - the closest one to Reigen's apartment - surrounded by no small amount of screaming and cursing.
But Reigen was used to that by now, and a couple of the nurses were quick enough to approach them, themselves used to these semi-regular surprise visits.
He was less focused on the hubbub around him, more on the thoughtful expression Mob had worn after exorcising that…god, spirit, remnant, fragment…whatever it had been. Mob had tried to explain it to him a few times, over the years. What it was like to interact with supernatural entities, to sense and use psychic energy, but all Reigen got out of those explanations was that you can't really explain sight to someone who was born blind. Ritsu - having gained his powers when he was older - had confirmed it. Said that he didn't really have any useful analogies to use for it.
He supposed he got a glimpse during that power transfer, but he didn't think the way he experienced it was the same as a true esper would. Besides, it was too brief for him to make much sense of it. Even after all these years, Reigen was flying in the dark, surrounded by people who could see the full spectrum of light.
But still, as terrifying as it was, it was also fascinating. Exhilarating. He couldn't help feeling drawn to this world, to the people inhabiting it. Wondering what exactly it was like for them. Wondering just how differently their minds worked. It wasn't that he was jealous. It wasn't that he envied them. But he did wonder.
He got a hospital bed very quickly, and as usual told Mob that he should leave as soon as he did. Get back to whatever he had been in the middle of when he received Reigen's call.
Also as usual, Mob refused, his expression hard, insistent on waiting until he was sure Reigen would be alright to be left on his own.
+
"I died in this godforsaken diner by choking on my sushi! Surrounded by people, but not one even tried to help! All of them staring in horror, but still not doing anything even as the burning in my lungs got worse and worse, as I fell to the floor, as I tried to reach out to them," the ghost - which looked like a large, balding, red man with a grotesquely bulging throat - shouted in anger. "As I started losing consciousness, I vowed to myself that if others here had allowed me to suffer so then the same way I shall make everyone else here suffer!"
"It's sad that no-one came to your aid," Mob said from where he was standing at Reigen's side. "I'm sorry that you died that way. But that's not an excuse to do what you've been doing. You weren't killed, it was just an unfortunate accident. And you're taking your anger out on innocent people. So I'm going to exorcise you now."
"As if I'd let you!"
The ghost charged at them, but of course it was no match for Mob, who didn't even bother raising his arm before disintegrating it, making it burst and dissolve within the swirling blues and pinks and purples of his psychic energy.
When the light show was done with, Reigen turned to him with a grin. "Good job, as always. Thanks, Mob. Seriously. It's been a while since I've been able to give Katsuya a proper break, so you agreeing to go full-time for a few days has been a real blessing."
Mob gave him a slow blink. "I didn't agree. I offered. It's nice, being able to work with you again. It stopped feeling like anything particularly special pretty quickly when I was doing it on a regular basis, but now that I get to do it so rarely…I guess it feels nostalgic."
"Yeah, no kidding," Reigen agreed, turning to head back out the front door of the diner, into the crisp winter air, Mob on his heels.
It wasn't that they didn't still see each other relatively often, but these days it was more as friends than as employer and employee, or as exorcism partners. Mob was right, the rare occasions when they got to do a job together felt a lot more special now than they did back then.
Once they were out on the sidewalk, Reigen paused to light up. Savored the first deep drag. The feel of the cigarette between his fingers. Of breathing the smoke in and out. The ritual of it. Oh, how he had missed it during the time he'd given it up.
"I didn't know you smoked," Mob said on his first exhale. Cold air. Condensation. It looked like Mob was exhaling smoke himself.
Reigen glanced over, quirking a smile. "There are plenty of things you don't know about me. Just as there are plenty of things I don't know about you, I'm sure."
Mob didn't respond to that directly. "But…why? You know how bad it is for you, don't you?"
Reigen resisted the urge to childishly roll his eyes. Instead he decided to childishly go with sarcasm. "You don't say."
"I'm being serious," Mob said, turning far enough that he could see the diner behind them, then back around to look at Reigen. Reigen could feel his gaze boring into the side of his face. "I know that lung cancer isn't the same thing as choking, but…it kind of sounds like an even worse way to go. At least if you choke, it'll be over with relatively quickly. With lung cancer, the suffering could stretch on for a while."
Reigen hummed. "I suppose so."
"So why are you doing this?"
Eighteen now, attending university, but sometimes still so innocent. Always so sincere. Reigen felt a flare of affection in his chest.
"As they say. Once an addict, always an addict," he responded wryly.
There was a long silence.
"But I've never seen you smoke before," Mob said eventually, sounding confused. "And we've been on jobs where we spent more than a whole day together, barely out of each other's sight. You've never smelled of tobacco, either. How can you be an addict?"
He was wrong, though, wasn't he. "You did see me smoke before. Or…well, see me put a cigarette out, at least. The day we met. The first time you came to my office." The day Reigen had to start and then continue fighting his cravings.
"I…don't remember that."
Reigen shrugged while taking another drag. Blew the smoke out through his nose this time. "I quit as soon as you started hanging around. And you were really young back then. Most memories from that time eventually fade. Although…most memories you make as you get older fade too, I guess. The feelings, impressions are what's more likely to remain."
He turned on his heel and started a slow stroll back towards the office, Mob easily falling into step with him.
"You quit because of me?" he asked.
"Well, yeah, didn't want to be a bad influence. Didn't want to expose you to second hand smoke, or the smell," he said. Was that ironic? Hypocritical? No, he didn't think so, not this part of their relationship. He may have been a fraud and a liar, he may have taken advantage of Mob, but he'd never tried to pass on his own worst traits and habits to him. He'd never wanted to hurt him, either.
"Then you didn't smoke for what? Seven years? Eight? Clearly you could stop for good if you wanted to. A lack of will-power was never one of your flaws."
Reigen could see from the corner of his eye that Mob was still looking directly at him instead of paying attention to where he was going, so he took hold of his arm to pull him out of the way of a patch of ice on the ground.
Mob stumbled, looked behind him, then trained his head forward as they kept walking. "Thanks," he muttered.
"No problem," Reigen said absently. "And sure, I could stop if I really wanted to. But I don't. I had a good reason before. Now, it's gone."
"Why? What changed?"
Reigen grinned, and reached over to ruffle his hair. "What changed is that you're not a kid anymore, but a fine young man." He'd sort of expected Mob to draw away from the patronizing treatment, but he didn't.
"Isn't your own health a good enough reason?" he asked as Reigen lowered his hand to stuff it back into the pocket of his coat.
Reigen shrugged. "I'm allowed to have my vices, and only about fifteen percent of smokers get lung cancer, from what I remember. Given my luck with cheating death, I think it's safe enough for me to take my chances. Don't you?"
He was suddenly grabbed by the shoulder and forcibly turned to face Mob, who looked…about as frustrated as Reigen had ever seen him. The cigarette was unceremoniously snatched out of his hand.
"How can you act so…so indifferent when we're talking about your well-being? Your life? Would you act the same way if I decided to take up smoking too?"
Reigen hesitated. Clearly he was more upset by this than Reigen had thought he would be, and it's not like Reigen wanted to upset him even further. So he took a moment to try and figure out what would be the best way to respond here. Should he lie and promise to stop and then just…not? But no, he tried to be more honest with Mob these days. He didn't love the idea of backsliding like that. Besides, he doubted that he'd be able to manage it for long even if he tried. Soon enough the smell would start lingering on him at all times.
"Mob, I appreciate your concern, I do, but do you really think that," he nodded at the cigarette, "is a bigger threat to my well-being than my job? Than me confronting spirits and ghosts and espers when I don't actually have any psychic powers? And you've never made a big deal out of it. What makes this so different?"
Mob pursed his lips. "Of course I want to make a big deal out of your job too, I just don't feel like it's my place. Because that's how we met. That's why we met. That's who you've always been, for as long as I've known you. I don't think I have the right to try and change that part of you."
"You're right, you don't," Reigen said. "Just as you don't have the right to change this part of me. And I don't have the right to change any part of you." He held out his hand for his cigarette.
Mob's shoulders slumped, but after a moment of stillness he handed it back over.
Reigen took his portable ashtray out of his inside jacket pocket and stubbed the cigarette out, then repocketed the ashtray. When he glanced back up, Mob was looking at him with an uncertain expression.
Reigen sighed. "Look, if it bothers you that much, I won't smoke around you anymore, okay? But at the end of the day I get to live my life how I want to, and make my own choices, even if you think they're bad ones." He paused, as a sudden realization hit him. "Wait, is this why you've been acting so weird any time I call you in an emergency? Because it makes you worry?"
"Of course it makes me worry," Mob said flatly, dropping his gaze. "You know so many espers. Why can't you have at least one of us with you at all times when you're working? Why do you keep taking these unnecessary risks? I know I can get to you pretty quickly when you call, but what if one day I'm not quick enough? What if one day something irreversible happens before you can call?"
"I can't tie all of you to my life and my job," Reigen responded, exasperated. "You have your own responsibilities. Other priorities. You have classes to attend, studying to do, family and other friends to spend time with, hobbies. Mob, I already do my best to have help at the ready whenever possible, but it's not like you can be there for me every minute of every day."
When Mob continued looking down, but clearly didn't have any other arguments to make either, Reigen took him by the shoulders. "Mob, look at me." He did, from under his fringe. "If one day something does happen, then it won't be your fault. It will be mine. It's kind of you to help me, but my safety isn't your responsibility."
Mob's face went through about ten different expressions in a matter of seconds, but then he deflated. "Fine," he breathed out. "I never could win against you in an argument, anyway. I'm…I don't want to fight about this anymore."
Well thank god for small miracles.
Reigen took a deep breath, then slowly let it out. "Neither do I," he admitted, squeezing Mob's shoulders before letting go and stepping back. "But if you're feeling too annoyed at me right now to come back to the office, I'd understand. Feel free to take the rest of the day off if you like."
Mob's resigned expression turned into a glare, and he opened his mouth to - presumably - chew Reigen out for not listening, but Reigen had already realized his mistake, and held his hands out placatingly to preempt him. "Sorry! Sorry. Let's pretend I didn't say that. No being left alone when it can be helped, right?"
Mob continued glaring for another few seconds, then marched past him. Reigen followed warily a couple of paces behind. Boy, Mob rarely either got or looked angry, but when he did? He could look outright menacing.
Somehow he had a feeling they weren't done talking about this.
+
"Look, I just don't get the appeal of most movies, you know this," Reigen told Mob, who was sitting beside him on his couch as they watched the end credits roll by, sound muted. "If they're too fluffy or over the top, it feels unrealistic. If they're too ugly or depressing, it feels like they're going for shock value. The characters constantly act like completely irrational morons, which...sure, can be totally true for real people, except it's not depicted in a realistic irrational moron way."
Mob squinted at him. "Master, do you not have the ability to separate fiction from reality?"
Reigen squinted back. "Given all of the crazy things I've seen you do, would you blame me if I couldn't?" He didn't bother telling Mob to stop calling him Master yet again. Sometimes he remembered to call him Arataka instead, but an ingrained habit like that would take time to overcome entirely.
"Um."
Reigen waved at him dismissively. "Never mind. Of course I do. Still, even if it's fiction, I'd rather watch something that's actually realistic. Or else something so bad that it will literally bore me to sleep. B-rated movies make for excellent sleeping aids, just so you know."
"I'll take your word for it," Mob said, as he reached for the remote and turned the TV off. "I've been thinking about something."
Way to be vague, but it was hardly the first time Mob had started or redirected a conversation this way when something was weighing on his mind.
"Alright," Reigen said, after clearing his throat and taking a sip of his tea. "What's up?"
"Do you remember that conversation we had about you smoking?" Mob asked, clenching his hands together in his lap.
Well, hell. Reigen suppressed a groan. But it's not like he hadn't known that round two was coming at some point. He should never have smoked in front of Mob. Could have blamed the smell on a repeat client who was a chain smoker. He especially shouldn't have compounded the issue by bringing his work into it. But too late to take any of it back. "Of course I remember. It was only a few weeks ago."
Mob ignored his snippy tone. "I've been thinking about what we said. About responsibility. About me not having a right to try to change you. And I changed my mind. I think I do have a right."
Reigen didn't like how firm he sounded. The last time they talked about this, he had been caught off guard, unprepared, and therefore more likely to be influenced. But when Mob dug his heels in about something? Budging him was practically impossible. "Do we really have to rehash this? I thought you said that you didn't want to fight about it anymore."
"I don't. But I do want us to talk. And I know how stubborn you can be, but can you please really listen?"
The pot said to the kettle - how he sometimes missed the younger Mob, who soaked in everything Reigen said without question - but it's not like Reigen could just say no to that earnest expression. And even if he did, it's not like Mob would just say okay and give up. Might as well get this over with. "I always listen to you. But just because I'll listen doesn't mean that I'll end up agreeing."
Mob twisted to sit sideways on the couch, feet crossed and knees drawn up. Reigen obliged him and shifted too, so they could face each other.
"People can change. People can help other people change, too. You know this."
"Sure, but it being a thing that can happen doesn't make it a right."
"No, not always, but in our case I think that it is a right." Mob levelled him with an intense, piercing gaze that almost made Reigen want to shrink back.
I never could win against you in an argument.
That's what he'd said, but he was wrong. Maybe it wasn't arguments, exactly, but he'd affected Reigen in so many ways through both his words and his actions. Reigen felt like he had an advantage over most people when it came to talking, but it had been a very long time since he'd felt like he had an advantage over Mob.
"You chose to take me in. You chose to become someone important to me. You can't just take that back."
Reigen frowned. "When have I ever tried to?" He knew that. He knew what he'd made himself into, with Mob. And he knew that he'd effectively faked a lot of it earlier on, but he'd never flaked out.
"Any time you've ignored how you getting yourself hurt or sick would affect me. It's selfish. You've told me before that my life is my own, but that's not true. Not entirely. It belongs to everyone I care about, too. So does yours. Maybe you're not obligated to comply with every request I make, but I do have a right to make those requests, and to expect you to consider my feelings when I ask something of you."
"I do. I only smoked when you were there that one time, didn't I?" Reigen pointed out. "I stopped calling you out of the blue unless I really needed you a long while ago. You know that I'm willing to compromise."
"So let's compromise," Mob fired back instantly. "Stop smoking, and I won't bother you about your careless lack of self regard anymore. Keep smoking, and this is a conversation I'll force you to have again and again."
"That's…" Reigen started, then trailed off. That's what? Not fair? A threat? Coercion? It wasn't exactly an ultimatum. And they'd both suffer for it. Part of Reigen wanted to lash out, to tell him that he was overstepping, but he knew that it was coming from a place of genuine care, so he forced that part down. "You mentioned before that your dad is also a smoker. Do you get on his case about it too?"
Mob shifted, seeming to lose some of his intensity, his certainty. "No, but…that's different."
"How?"
"He's my dad. He's responsible for me, I'm not responsible for him."
"Why do you think that you're responsible for me?" Reigen asked. "I keep telling you that you're not."
Mob dropped his gaze, but it looked like thoughtfulness, not surrender. He took his time responding. "Because you forced me to feel that way, I suppose."
Reigen twitched, his heart dropping into his stomach. "What?"
"I'm not…complaining. It's just that for all of your talk about me leaving things to you because you were the adult, you actually left most of it to me, didn't you? You've always expected me to protect you, keep you safe. Why are you surprised that you placing that responsibility on me made me feel responsible for you?"
Reigen felt frozen, unable to respond.
It's not that Mob was wrong. And for all that he was now pretty good about respecting Mob's boundaries, he did still default to relying on him when the going got tough. Was he being unreasonable? He'd offered to back off even more, but he knew that it wasn't that simple. They were friends, practically family. They had history, and Mob was a kind soul. Of course he wouldn't just leave Reigen to his own devices.
"Your work helps people. It's important to you," Mob went on quietly when Reigen didn't say anything. "It makes me worry, but I get it. Why you do it. I see the benefit that both you and others get out of it. But what benefit is there to you smoking?"
The benefit was succumbing to a yearning. Not having to spend every day fighting a constant nagging urge. The relief it brought. But Reigen knew that this answer wouldn't satisfy Mob.
"You've stopped for me before. Won't you do it again? Not because I'm a kid, but because I matter to you?"
He'd accuse Mob of emotional manipulation, but Reigen knew that that wasn't how he operated. It was a genuine question, a heartfelt request, about something that really mattered to him.
Reigen put his cup down on the table, pushed himself off the couch, and walked onto his balcony. Leaned his forearms on the railing and hung his head. He felt like he needed some fresh air. Not that the air here was all that fresh. Maybe he should ask Mob to teleport him to a nearby mountain. A nearby deserted island.
Damn. He'd thought that he'd become better, as a person. As a friend. But Mob saying that? Mob feeling that Reigen had made himself his responsibility when he was just a kid? Where did that leave them? What was Reigen supposed to do with that?
"I'm sorry," Mob said hesitantly from the balcony doorway a couple of minutes later. "I didn't mean to make you feel bad. I was just trying to make you understand."
"Hey, Mob," Reigen said to the asphalt below. "Do you think that we're good for each other? You said that you see the benefit of the work I do but not of me smoking. What's the benefit of us?"
"What?" Mob asked, sounding bewildered. "How can you ask that?"
"I'm serious. I see how you benefit me, but in what way do I benefit you, if all I do is ask for your help and stress you out?"
There was a brief silence, then a few soft footsteps, and two hands grasping the railing beside him.
"I keep forgetting how insecure you can be, because you put up such a good front most of the time. Do you care about me?"
Reigen's head jerked up at that. "Of course I do."
"Just because I'm useful?"
"No! Because you're…you."
Mob nodded. "And I care because you're you. Isn't caring and being cared for in return a benefit in its own right?"
That was something of a non-answer, but he thought he understood what Mob meant. Maybe him asking that had been kind of unnecessarily melodramatic.
Reigen snorted and looked up at the sky. Clouds. Smog. Light pollution. If they were somewhere without those, they'd be able to see the stars. The Milky Way. Constellations.
"I'll stop smoking," he said.
"Thank you," Mob responded, leaning over to gently bump their shoulders together.