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The truth is that the moon does not follow you around. The reason it seems as if the moon is trailing behind you is scientific. It seems as if it's always following, because the distance between you, who is standing on Earth, and the moon is enormous—triggering an optical illusion known as 'motion parallax'. Your brain tricks itself into thinking the lunar body is moving alongside you, when it is merely in its spot.
•
Science and sentimentalism often don't go along well together. It's only natural, when does logic mesh well with irrationality? Emotions are dangerous in their nature, in their all-consuming, and the human mind only handle one can form of intensity at a time.
Senkuu does not pay special mind to things like the last time someone hugged him, the times he went to eat with Byakuya, and such. And while he appreciates aesthetic beauty, he does so the way a person appreciates apricating.
The incessant nature of sun, warming up a person and a golden glow encapsulating you.
A beautiful thing, or place, is just that, pleasing to the eye. It doesn't contribute much else, except for perhaps the satisfactory and pleasant feeling which flows down a person upon seeing such a thing.
He's heard enough poetry about fields and mountains and passions and what not from the people around him.
But that was when the world wasn't a graveyard of 7.8 billion petrified humans.
So, yes.
Senkuu isn't one for waxing poetic about things like the moon rising, or something.
But his spot on the floor of his observatory does prove to be a good spot for watching the night sky, the abundance of stars spilling onto a canvas of blues and blacks.
The wind carries the scent of flowers to him, a cordial breeze slinking in. For a second he looks up and.
Senkuu might not be a sentimental person—outwardly, Byakuya teases—but he thinks he can get lost in the same thing which grabbed his attention and never quite let go all those years ago over and over.
The moon is beautiful tonight.
The white, black and purple of the sky reminds him of something soothing, comfortable and the scent of nightshades which engulfs their observatory makes him smile.
He isn't moving, and neither is the satellite up in the sky.
It's perfect, his mind starts.
if only Gen would be here too., it ends.
Senkuu is so surprised by that sudden train of thought that he near-jerks from his lazy stature on the floor.
What even—Gen?
The scientist feels something crawl across his skin, and maybe warmth bloom against his ears, but that's neither here nor is it there, is it?
He tears his gaze away from the moon and has the urge to put his head in his hands, and you know what, why not that's a ten billion percent wonderful idea—
"Senkuu-chan? You're not having a meltdown are you? Oops, is this the point you freeze up and start to utter-stay?"
A teasing, smooth voice enters, and Senkuu catalogues the scent of nightshades before he registers the sight of a purple shadow serving tea in earthen vessels.
He looks pretty.
Nope.
"What are you talking about? Anyway, Mentalist, aren't you late today?"
Senkuu lets a smirk form on his face, amused at the crinkle in deep grey eyes. Eyes closed and lying down, there is no way to mistake the smile in his mentalist's voice as he answers.
"Changing the topic, Senkuu-chan? Eally-ray? But, fine~ What is a mentalist's job if not to indulge his moody scientist chief?"
Snorting, he gestures for Gen to sit down leisurely.
"Indulge? What am I, a kid lying after messing around? That's your forte."
The sound of wind chimes floats in the air, and that's weird because last Senkuu checked they still didn't have wind chimes in the Stone Age—
“Now, now, Senkuu-chan! I never did say that, did I?"
Gen's laugh is like the success of a new experiment, he decides, like stellar scintillation, like the first wave of electricity which powered Edison's bulb.
Simultaneously, Senkuu turns over and bangs his head against the observatory floor because what the fuck—
The truth is pretty simple. Motion parallax makes objects closer to your immediate vicinity zip past rapidly, while distant objects seem to follow you along. When your body is in motion, nearby objects sweep by quickly in your visual field because of the wider angle formed on the retina, and far away objects seem to move slowly because of the shorter angle formations. So, really, the one moving around is you, not the moon.
•
"Senkuu-chan~! You must hide me quickly, or Kaseki-chan will work me to the bone!"
It's a calming day in the Kingdom of Science, and most of the village is busy with winter preparations and the making of the cell phone.
"Now, mentalist, why would I do that? Go help with the work—"
Gen sighs in his melodramatic way and twirls closer to Senkuu.
"—or are you here to volunteer with the science team?"
Senkuu wishes with a raised eyebrow. Chrome is working on the composition of sodium sulphate for finer glass production, and he is working with methanol compounds.
"Hm, I would say yes but the last time that happened I was roped in for making tungsten toothpaste, and that's not quite where I excel, you ee-say."
Gen leans in closer, hands folded under the sleeves of his kimono, but still at a respectable enough distance. Senkuu feels himself relax, where normally he'd go taut. He doesn't think he minds, which. Well, that's concerning.
"Given that you did nothing, I'd say you enjoyed it quite a lot."
The concentration of methanol was too low for formalin formation.
"Scandalous, Senkuu-chan! How could you ever imply me having fun for skipping work? When have I done that? "
The methanol they need to make the proper amount of formalin for making plastic won't be covered by this much. He'd need to make more.
"Literally everytime you weasel out of it. If not, hand me that flask."
Senkuu might not be caught off-guard most times, but the prospect after it happened was too good to miss.
"Which one?"
Gen's voice is too sweet, a clear indication he's up to no good. Senkuu feels himself smile.
"The clear one."
There go exactly 14 seconds between them in which Gen spins on his feet and takes a look around the lab. Then, he starts, in faux innocence.
"They're all clear."
The same feelings from that night surge up, slightly subdued. Interesting.
"The one on the left."
Senkuu thinks sending him away might be the smarter choice.
"Your left or my left?"
He doesn't.
"Really?"
Maybe it's his headache. Then again, Gen, confusing feelings and being on the edge aren't exactly mutually exclusive.
"You'll have early wrinkles if you keep frowning, Senkuu-chan. I am being totally, completely, fully serious."
What subdued? It's there in full and yeah no he needs to bang his head against the wood again.
"The left of the table."
Gen doesn't even try to hide his airy laugh when he answers next, and yeah Senkuu enjoys their back and forth, sure, but any more exposure to this before he finishes his plastic, and Senkuu will combust.
"The table doesn't have a left."
In faux annoyance, he feels himself sigh, and level their resident fake magician with a flat glare.
"Mentalist."
The look on his face tells him that the older man is entirely too pleased with his antics, and his answer in the same, teasing tone is more than enough proof, really.
"Senkuu-chan~"
And yeah, if they weren't in the lab with a third person working a little further off and he wasn't holding literal methanol in his hands, Senkuu was sure his ears would heat up and they'd get a less than present head scientist to deal with. Hell, that was a close thing right now.
"You're doing this on purpose."
Gen isn't a bat, Senkuu thinks as sunlight shines through ivory hair, but a cunning fox. A clever fox, with a bite as dangerous as it is annoying.
"Am I?"
Senkuu needs to. Focus. Gen absorbs his attention like electrons absorb energy and convert radiation to internal thermal energy.
"If you two are done with your flirting, Kaseki oji-san is looking for you, Gen."
Senkuu didn't know he could be grateful to Kohaku even in moments like this, but here they are. But Gen and him weren't flirting. He grunts towards her in greeting.
"Flirting? Oh please, Kohaku-chan, the only way to flirt with Senku-chan is in scientific terminology, and I don't know nearly enough about at-thay."
Well, mean, but Senkuu supposed there was no need to point it out. As for all he knew, the thrumming feeling under his skin was still there and there's Gen everywhere—
"Uh-huh."
When they leave, two curious things happen.
One, relief. That Gen's gone and he can finally get back to his formalin.
Two, disappointment. That Gen's off to work somewhere and Senkuu can't see him.
Which. He might not be much of a romantic, but he is much of a researcher.
Maybe he should check on what the old man's making, after he's done with his rudimentary plastic making session.
The truth is as such: the phenomenon of motion parallax is a fact of physics. It is not a choice you can participate in. Whether you like it or not, the optical illusion is evergreen, and therefore, the moon follows you and you follow the moon. To acknowledge it, however, is a choice you are allowed to make.
•
Senkuu would've picked up science regardless of whether the sight of the moon and stars gripped his young mind by the neck or not.
He would've fallen in love with science anyway, uncaring of the how or why. For Senkuu, he cannot imagine a life where he and science are not entwined in one manner or the other.
That simply isn't a possibility, because Senkuu knows himself enough to know that nothing can quite capture and entertain and enrapture him like the appeal of the unknown can.
Like science and reasoning and research and the shared work of humanity through millenia can. He knows he'll always come back to science, to the wonder of the cosmos, because there is science all around and him and humans are susceptible beings.
But, he huffs as he adjusts the measurements for his Stenopeic Glasses, he supposes being consumed by science because of the moon is objectively, a beautiful thing.
Would there really exist an universe out there where Ishigami Senkuu is not pulled in by the allure of the stars?
Would there ever exist an universe out there where the Kingdom of Science prevailed without its Mentalist?
Like that, would there be such an universe where Senkuu was ever alluded into astrophysics at all, where the Kingdom of Science existed at all?
Senkuu thinks, not for the first time, that rhetorics are illogical things and much suited to a philosopher than a scientist.
"Mentalist, are you sure you won't need anything else? Yeah, you've got Magma and no one likely visits my grave other than those two, but it's likely that Tsukasa has taken some measures."
And when Senkuu turns around to look at Gen's cot on his side of the hut, he's unprepared to see him without his kimono, but he's not surprised. His mentalist is preparing for combat in deception and traps, and Senkuu understands.
"Senkuu-chan. It's okay. We can handle this, you know? We can handle this ell-way."
There is a noticeable shaking quality to his voice, a vulnerability he trusts Senkuu with.
"Gen."
It warms his heart as much as it cools his head.
"We'll be okay, alright? Don't worry so much."
When they leave, he won't be everywhere around Senkuu. When they leave, Senkuu won't have a stealthy right-hand with him. When they leave, he'll also take away Senkuu's peace with him.
"Gen."
One of the most fragile reactions is the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide. Even the slightest changes in the amount of light exposure can accelerate the process.
"What, Senkuu-chan?"
Gen is like that. He is someone who needs to be handled with extreme care, but that's not to be mistaken with weakness. Gen is like hydrogen peroxide, useful in a ridiculous number of ways, surprisingly versatile, harmless in its looks, with a tendency to make other reactions—plans, schemes, anything—happen faster.
"The cost of the war is neither of your lives."
Innocuous until suddenly it very much isn't.
"I don't understand why you want this to be bloodless. He killed you, once. He's out to kill you."
He doesn't know why. He doesn't know what. But he knows he wants to keep pale, unblemished shoulders safe. But more than that, he knows he wants to trust Gen with everything he can.
"And the alternative? He's going to prove his point. We will be no different than— science isn't meant for realizing the limits of mortality."
Senkuu has been running a study, and the study shows him he is becoming irrational and that would be a problem if it wasn't related to Gen.
"I don't want to die, Senkuu-chan. I don't want anyone to. But I don't think I mind if some people stay dead."
When it comes to Gen, the line between who orbits who becomes blurry. They're like alloys, perhaps even gravitational systems, so intermixed within their entirety that it's near impossible to determine the inseparable constituents, distinguish cause and effect.
"Don't be the reason my observatory has less visits."
There's something in Gen's expression that Senkuu can't quite categorize, but he thinks that's not his place. It's his mentalist's job, after all.
"Don't work our citizens to death by the time I am back."
They part ways the next day, and they might have promised to fall into hell together, but an infernal void opens up somewhere between his heart and mind when he can't find the man as he seeks.
Chrome, Magma, and Gen are only going to be gone a few days, but they are also going to their possible deaths and.
When Senkuu moves, the moon moves alongside him.
The truth is as such: motion parallax is one of the monocular depth cues your brain uses to judge distance. As you move, your brain builds a sense of depth from motion alone. So, when the moon follows you, you're the one following it. You account for its presence without realizing it, unconsciously adjusting your perception around a constant that never truly moves.
•
Time moves strangely after everything. Time moves too quickly for Senkuu to rationalize fully, between gaining allies in the Kingdom of Might, Chrome escaping on his own, the ensuing battle between science and power, the creation of nitroglycerin, and building a refrigerator for Tsukasa's cryogenic sleep.
They move in a way that leaves them dazed and disoriented, neither of them realizing when their depth perception was thrown off balance and when it was fixed.
Days after, he's back on the floor of their observatory—his observatory, Gen likes to chide with a teasing lilt—and this time schematics of a ship surround him. Pieces of charcoal and rudimentary paper is around him, and the summer sky is endless above him.
He's been working a while, and his hands reach for the cup of tea he knows is there, and halfway he is reminded that the observatory is empty save for him.
The stars in the sky are twinkling. It's the night of a new moon, and above the reach of mortality is the ever-expanding cosmos, a canvas of one colour and countless colours.
He's unused to a space where his mentalist isn't present, and his mentalist is unused to a place he is not present.
They have adapted themselves like that, within easy reach should the other try to find them. Senkuu doesn't remember when he was allowed to smell nightshades, or when he made things like the first deck of cards as a not-gift to give at an appropriate time, but it happened and that's what it is.
He walks towards a clearing some ways from the village, a hidden nook near the river. He slides down a well trodden path, worn by feet not his but ones he would recognize as easily as he recognizes the certainty in science.
The thing about human nature is that its routine is adaptation and adaptation is its routine. There really is no way to track evolutionary progress—even on a small scale—than analyze a stupid amount of data and compare it to live results.
Senkuu is evidently not an evolutionary scientist, so he can't really be faulted for not realizing things earlier. He wants to be faulted anyway.
When he sits, he reaches a hand towards one of his most trusted. When his hand taken, Senkuu is reciprocated with the fact someone took the hand of their most trusted, too.
"Senkuu-chan."
His voice is soft, tired at the edges.
"No."
Senkuu replies in an exasperated manner, watching starlight reflect off the river.
"I haven't even asked anything yet."
Gen squeezes his hand idly, rubbing circles into it and some more.
"Then I'm getting ahead of the problem."
Hasn't it been a while since they got to rest?
"You wound me."
Things are still the same. Or not. But they are fundamentally the same.
"You're still standing."
His voice is flat, teasing in a way only their resident most shallow person could pick up on.
"Barely."
He snuggles closer to Senkuu, and his heart starts to beat with more contentment.
"Your pulse seems stable."
It does, he knows, as he runs a soothing hand on his wrists.
"That's because I'm resilient in the face of cruelty."
Cruelty, he muses, under the starry, moonless sky.
"That's because you're annoying."
He replies, honesty bleeding into his words. Gen hums.
"Those two traits aren't mutually exclusive."
Senku wants to chuckle and also point a screwdriver at him.
"Don't encourage yourself."
"See, that's where you're mistaken."
Gen leans against him, face practically in Senkuu's lap and yeah, maybe he does understand what it means for his heart to skip a beat.
"I'm not encouraging myself. I'm encouraging you."
There's a fond, dangerous look in Gen's eyes.
"To do what?"
There's an equal look in Senkuu's.
"Become a kinder employer."
And— well, that's. He laughs, head thrown back and all.
"Denied."
His response is airy, and a pout forms on Gen's face, but also, he's smiling too.
"I haven't submitted the proposal."
Grey eyes crinkle in amusement, mirth and monocular cues.
"Preemptively denied."
This time, Gen also laughs, shaking a bit.
"You don't even know the contents."
The banter comes as easy to them as combustion reactions come to fuels and oxygen.
"I know the author."
There's a cheeky grin on their faces, sappy and entirely too much and too little. Gen clicks his tongue.
"Bias."
Senkuu reaches down and tugs their hands together, thinking of telescopes and floorboards and mentalists who know things they shouldn't.
"Pattern recognition."
Gen smiles again and this one is so genuine it makes his cheeks ache.
"That's a very fancy way of saying bias."
Senkuu wants them to meld closer, impossibly closer, so they whizz past another and also remain moving beside each other.
"That's a very biased way of interpreting pattern recognition."
For a moment they stare at each other. Then Gen laughs again, and Senkuu immediately narrows his eyes in something which feels too close to indulgence.
"Mm?"
Senku smirks. Gen's face goes red, likely matching with Senkuu's own. Except red compliments purple well.
"Oh, that's evil."
"Thank you."
"That wasn't a compliment."
"It sounded like one."
"See? This is why nobody trusts scientists."
"Nobody trusts mentalists either."
"Fair."
They lapse into silence, a peaceful one.
The kind that appears after years of learning exactly how much space another person occupies.
The kind that happens when you both reach up and lean in and kiss your grievances and trusts and beliefs into one another.
The moon is beautiful.
The truth is simple. You move, and so does the moon, and it is in its absence you realize you can exist without the other. And that you continue to exist with each other anyway.
And that's exhilarating.