Flowers: Life or Death! (Akatsuki)

He didn’t know how to respond to the notion that his life was more important than those around him. It was a disturbing thought that life could even have a value placed on it that could be measured to the point where one life meant more than another. What was the measure of one’s life value? Was it as simple as it being Akatsuki’s mandate to keep Gaen alive that made the small medic’s life more precious to the masked man than the lives of those dead on the ground? Was it because he was a medic, somebody who saved the lives of others where these men did what they did and killed because of it? Did killing lower the value of your life? If so then why was there so much veneration placed on soldiers and so little placed on the shoulders of doctors and healers? In the end, Gaen had to conclude that there was no real answer, that in this situation, Akatsuki had to kill in order to keep him safe. It was easier to keep it simple like that, and Gaen was in no condition to ponder the philosophical implications of some sort of celestial grading system for value of life.

He slowly got to his feet, trying his best not to vomit or pass out. He was about to start walking when he realized that his guardian for the afternoon had been injured. Gaen almost felt a wave of relief wash over him as he suddenly had something practical to do, something that could take his mind off of what had just happened.

Here, I’ll take care of that before we get going. He said, though honestly wouldn’t have minded putting some space between them and this grizzly scene before stopping to held with Akatsukis’ arm. His hand glowed a soft green, holding it right over the wound on the man’s arm, letting the energy go out and stitch together the injury. So… what do we do with the bodies? He asked as he continued with healing his friend. He was so out of the loop in terms of combat, he didn’t know how or even if there was a process in place to handle the bodies of the fallen enemies. Did they eventually vanish as hollow bodies tended to, or were there funerary rites that had to be performed?

Word Count: 395

Gaen was more than a little relieved to hear that the bodies would take care of themselves. He didn’t know how long they would be there, but he really, really hoped that they would be gone by the time he and Akatsuki were making their return trip. It was sort of eerie knowing that having died here, they were being reborn in the mortal plane. He hoped they lived better lives there then they had here, it was probably the only way he could reconcile with being a party in their deaths.

Gaen gave a nod when Akatsuki mentioned that they should be on their way. Reinforcements seemed an unlikely thing to pop up, but Gaen wanted to spare the bandits the danger of coming against the two Shinigami again. He finished with his healing kido, the skin untouched and the only reason one would think there was an injury would be the cut jacket and remnants of blood. Gaen started walking down the road again, eager to leave the area and get back to their mission. It was almost laughable that their mission was literally picking flowers at this point. He would have flat out refused if he had known this would happen. He of course knew there was no way of knowing, and that every step they took was a roll of the die as to whether or not they would be forced to defend themselves again.

I’m sorry Akatsuki, I… I know you don’t enjoy doing that. If I had been more aware, you wouldn’t have had to… He said with a sigh and a slight slump in his shoulders. It was a horrible incident and nothing could be done about it now. Move forward. Thank you. You saved my life probably a few times back there. I’m going to need to make you a cake or something. He said with a bit of a forced smile. He didn’t want to drag the both of them down, no point in making Akatsuki feel guilty for what he did in the line of duty. I make a mean vegan cheese cake. It doesn’t taste exactly like normal cheese cake, but it’s still tasty.

Word Count: 365

The grip on his shoulder was a gentle reminder and spoke volumes for the hard spoken man Gaen was walking with. They both shared the discomfort of having dealt with that situation, and the one armed medic was more than willing to let the situation pass on into the distance.

Ya, a lot of fourth division members are vegetarians or vegans. He said in response to Akatsuki’s perplexed tone with regards to his offer of desserts. So, when a co-worker announced a ‘pot luck’ style lunch one afternoon, I decided to bring in a cheese cake. It took some looking and some inventive shopping, but I managed to pull together a half decent recipe. He said with a little pride, remembering the week or so of experimenting in his apartment with his tiny little oven. It took a while to gather everything of course, but after he found the right type of tofu to use, and a sugar called ‘agave’ he was off to the races. I’m a vegetarian personally, so I like normal cheese cake just fine. Fourth division has it in the cafeteria every Thursday if you wanted to try it. He offered, though didn’t really know what the policy was for other division members visiting for lunch. Everybody in the hospital was welcome to join in on the spoils of Fourth divisions’ expert culinary staff, so he didn’t think it would be much of a stretch. He also didn’t know what other divisions had in the way of meal choices. For all he knew, eleventh division just had a rack of raw meat that everybody gathered around and pulled off what they wanted. He was tempted to ask what Tenth division usually had on the menu, but decided not to ask Akatsuki to talk unnecessarily.

We’ll be there soon by the way, it should be just down this path and over a hill. He said, motioning towards a lightly beaten trail. He had to admit that despite their… delays… they had made pretty good time.

Word Count: 336

I like cheese and honey too much to be a vegan, personally. I’ve thought of it though, since I’m a vegetarian based on ethical reasons. He said, knowing that animals were frequently abused for the foods he enjoyed, even if they weren’t directly killed for them. He wasn’t certain what the circumstances were like for the food he ate in Seireitei though, something he’d have to look into. For all he knew, meat in the city was made in test tubes in Twelfth. He didn’t know if that made it more or less appetizing though. When Akatsuki mentioned being secluded when he ate, Gaen gave a raised eyebrow, being genuinely confused at the reasoning. Why would you eat alone? It’s really nice to be able to eat with friends. I personally really look forward to my afternoon salad, I get to hang out with some of my academy buds who work in different wards. He said, just before realizing what Akatsuki meant about not being the best to look at during lunch. Gaen, who had literally washed blood off his hand after gall bladder surgery directly before heading to the cafeteria, had no qualms about disfigurement or ‘gross’ things before, during or after meals. He was actually a little insulted on Akatsuki’s behalf, finding it distasteful that others might ostracize him because of how he looked! He then realized that Akatsuki probably secluded himself out of consideration for his division mates. Gaen generally did the same thing on the surprisingly frequent times he went shirtless, covering his scars with bandages as much as possible. You know, you can always swing by Fourth for lunch, I doubt anybody would look twice. Well, they may just to offer to help with that; I can understand that getting a little tedious. He said, remembering how for the first few weeks out of the academy, everybody in his division had offered to fix his arm at least twice. Hmm, just think about it, okay? He said as they worked their way through the brush and thicket. Gaen knew they were headed in the right direction now, he could smell sulfur in the air.

Word Count: 359

The brush and trees eventually gave way to a fairly large clearing with a hill in the middle of it. There was lush grass up until the ground started to rise into the hill where it suddenly died off, leaving nothing but dried and cracked earth. The smell of sulfur on the wind was much more distinct now, as well as hints of various other chemicals which seemed to waft down from the hill. Gaen seemed chipper enough though as he recognized the site of their end goal.

Here, you’re going to need one of these. Gaen said as he pulled out a pair of little cylinders not more than 10 centimeters long with a button on one end. Just hold the button and jam the other end into your leg. It’ll pinch, but you won’t have to worry about the air around here. It’s kinda poisonous. Gaen said, taking one of the auto-injectors and stabbing it into his own thigh. He twinged a bit at the familiar bite of a needle, but was secure in the knowledge that for the next half hour or so he could breathe clearly with a deluge of noxious volcanic gasses spewing in his face. In reality, the next little task wasn’t likely to take that long, but Gaen hurried up the hill anyway.

Upon reaching the top, he was finally hit by the heat as he looked down into a crevice nearly three meters wide that split the top of the hill. It looked like its depth was indefinite save for the faint red glow at what Gaen assumed was the bottom. Criss-crossing the span was a web of thick roots and yellow tinted vines, all going deep into the volcanic span. There were small blue flowers dotting the vines, flowers that Gaen was here to collect.

So then, most dangerous part of the mission: flower picking. Gaen said with a smile before he jumped into the hole.

Word Count: 325

Be delicate now, the petals bruise easily. You can put the ones you grab in this. Gaen said as he hooked his leg on a vine, swinging upside down as he grabbed his medical bag with the other leg to prevent it from falling as he rifled through it. He pulled out a metallic foil bag about the size of his torso. He swung from his vine to pass buy Akatsuki and dropped the bag for the masked man to catch before landing in a messy web of vines where he started to gently pick a few flowers. Oh, you also need to be careful about picking the flowers because when they're raw like this, if you they get hurt they spew out a little puff of paralytic. Breathe that in and you'll start losing control of your limbs, and I don't have an inoculate for that one. He said, very carefully pulling the flowers free from the stem of the plant. The paralytic these plants produced was a very clever defence mechanism since whatever gets hit with that would fall to a fiery death. It was also the primary ingredient to one of the stronger sedatives that the one armed man used fairly regularly. He dropped his picked flowers into a little foil bag of his own, looking over to Akatsuki to see if he was being sufficiently vigilant in his delicacy.

Word Count: 233

Gaen was enjoying his high risk flower picking, every now and again looking over to Akatsuki to see if he was picking his flowers with adequate care. The man seemed maybe a little over cautious, but that made sense, Gaen had a lot more experience dealing with this particular breed of flora. The risk of paralysis while dangling over a pit of lava was more than enough to ensure that one took care with their actions. For his part, Gaen was largely done, his bag about as full as he could manage while Akatsuki’s seemed to only be half at best.

You laugh, but the last guy who came out here tried that. Sent some of these little fellas to his manager as a joke, and it wasn’t funny. It was hilarious! The guy collapsed into his pancakes and glued one of the things to his forehead with the syrup. He got better an hour later, but he will forever be known as flapjack. Gaen let out a chuckle as he recalled the event, and while it was amusing, he personally would never have done something like that. It was a waste of the flowers first off, and otherwise it was kinda mean, even if it was meant as a good hearted joke. Anyway, we can leave now if you want, between the two of us we’ve got enough for the next few months and it’s always best to leave a small population of the flowers alone. Gaen said, hopping over to where Akatsuki had been harvesting his flowers; putting his own cache of medicinal daisies into his medical bag. When he landed near Akatsuki, he felt one of the vines beneath his feet suddenly give way. He managed to catch himself, grabbing hold of another nearby vine quickly. He also took the precaution of holding his breath in case the vine he grabbed jostled some of the remaining flowers. He quickly looked around and found this particular vine had been plucked clean, but he also found something he didn’t like the sight of. There was a trio of men at the edge of the crevice, one with a sort of pole axe who seemed intent on cutting the vines the two Shinigami were using as footing.

Get away from the crevice! The gases will kill you! Gaen shouted up at the men, swinging himself up to try and jump out of the crevice. Oddly, he was being very sincere, hoping he could get up to the surface in time to pull them away from the edge to safety. He wasn’t super effective at this though since the man with the pole ax managed to cut the vine he was holding onto before he could swing up and away. Gaen fell against the crevice wall, holding on for dear life to the end of the vine that was still growing from the rock face.

Gaen wasn’t a very heavy man. This was a fact often exploited by people that Gaen worked with in that he was often picked up like a sack of potatoes. Getting grabbed, pulled around, hoisted up and even thrown weren’t completely foreign experiences for the one armed medic. He even had a couple of friends (VERY large nurses) who actually made a game of tossing the diminutive fellow down the hall. It was all in good fun of course, Gaen always landed amicably in those situations. In this situation however, Gaen wasn’t really all that prepared for the hauling and throwing that occurred with what he could only assume was minimal effort on Akatsuki’s part. Gaen went spinning into the sky for a time that he thought was altogether far too long before making the eventual trip back down to the ground. If he had been prepared for this little maneuver, if he had the physical acuity for mid-air orienting, if he knew for a fact which way was up, he may have been able to land with a little dignity. With many things in Gaen’s life though, he didn’t end up completing this event with any dignity intact. He landed in a bush near the tree line, narrowly missing a tree branch and what would have likely been a black eye. The bush wasn’t particularly comfy upon landing, they looked so much cushier in cartoons, but in reality they were thinly veiled collections of generally spiky timber. In what could be considered a little blessing, the bush didn’t have thorns, so Gaen only had a few minor scrapes and bruises which was considerably better than falling to a fiery death at the hands of some bandits.

With the bandits still at large and facing off against Akatsuki, Gaen attempted to right himself to come to his masked friends’ aid. In a fantastic display of seemingly random flailing and shuffling, Gaen managed to get to his feet, turning to rush back over to the crevice. He turned just in time to see the three bodies fall to the ground, blood pouring out from stabs and slashes like a trio of morbid sprinklers. His friend was coated in blood, and even from the bottom of the hill he could see the man was still tensed and ready to murder whatever unfortunate soul came wandering by. It was a sense of anger that Gaen mirrored, though his ire wasn’t directed at the bandits, he cast his severely displeased gaze at Akatsuki. To Gaen there wasn’t a more abhorrent act than killing, it was probably the single thing he hated the most in this or any other world. Killing in self defense like what Akatsuki had done earlier, that was something that Gaen could only loosely consider as necessary, but this? Gaen was by all rights an inferior fighter to Akatsuki, but he could have knocked these men out in maybe two minutes, five if he had to drag them to safe to breath air afterwards. What Akatsuki just did was killing for killing’s sake, which made Gaen’s blood boil. For a moment, Gaen debated running up there and kicking the masked man in the face, something that would likely end poorly for the one armed man, but the desire was there none the less. Instead he opted to do something substantially more difficult: he forgave Akatsuki for an insult the man likely didn’t know he had cast at Gaen, chose to be there for his new friend and hopefully find out why such extreme measures were Akatsuki’s first reaction.

Akatsuki, we should get back to Seireitei. Gaen said, his displeasure leaking into his voice, though it was quickly being replaced with sadness. He was hoping that Akatsuki would calm down enough for them to talk about this, hopefully reveal his reasoning. Gaen debated having Akatsuki consult with one of the psychologists at fourth, it may be long overdue at this point.

Gaen watched with concern as Akatsuki fell to his knees, clutching at his throat just after the other bodies fell. The small medic’s knee jerk reaction was to start running up towards the kneeling Shinigami, concern growing in his chest that the man had been injured. There was way, way too much blood on the man to tell if he was bleeding, but all signs pointed to him needing medical attention. He knew that the combat squads tended to give relatively little concern for personal injury when they got into a fight, which could have been Fourth divisions fault honestly (why worry about getting hurt when your local hospital was so damn good at fixing you?). Regardless, Gaen stopped when Akatsuki got to his feet, giving a slight nod before appearing right next to the one armed man, a bit of a surprised yelp escaping him. Seems to be in decent enough condition… physically…[/i] Gaen thought, looking Akatsuki over quickly as they started heading back to the trail wordlessly.

Now, Gaen wasn’t very sure what to say at this point. From a medical stand point, he was pretty damn smart, he could name every bone in the body, list off dozens of medicines, he even once diagnosed a case of scurvy by smell! Still, his intelligence didn’t help him here because he wasn’t dealing with a blood clot or toxin, he was trying to broach a delicate topic with a person. Gaen wasn’t antisocial, but he was usually very passive in conversations, preferring to listen than talk and even then his friends only usually brought up ‘happy’ topics. This little mission was probably the most he had actually talked to anybody in weeks, and now he was trying to find the words to bring up what Akatsuki had just done. The mask didn’t help either, kinda hard to gauge a person’s mood when all you could see was a red stained piece of porcelain. If Gaen had to guess, he’d probably assume ‘sombre’ was the expression of the day.

I could just ask why he decided murdering those guys was the best course of action. He thought dryly, his anger at those actions leaking into his thoughts. He quickly dismissed the idea of attacking his friend so directly, even a socially stunted fellow like himself knew that was a low blow. Maybe I’ll just tell him to go to a psychiatrist when we get back. I can fill out the paper work, he’d get some time off, work through some stuff. Though he again thought better of saying what he was thinking, this time not wanting to insult the man. Many considered getting psychiatric help as a sign of weakness; how could somebody insinuate that they weren’t mentally fortified enough to handle the consequences of their actions! Gaen knew it was silly to think that way, but he didn’t know Akatsuki well enough to know if he’d consider such a suggestion a slap in the face or not. Finally, a thought crossed Gaen’s mind that very effectively summed up the small man’s main concern and primary focus.

Are you okay? He asked simply, looking up at the masked man.