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“Come here and help me, fellow modern man.”
Gen choked as Senku forcibly dragged him into the lab by the hood, not giving him much of a choice in the matter. He quickly decided it wasn’t worth it to fight the matter and let himself be deposited on a stool at the far end of the center table without a word. After Senku set Gen down, the scientist quickly set to work grabbing materials off the various shelves.
“Wh- What are we doing again?” Gen asked after a few minutes of watching Senku grab materials and mumble to himself.
“Making tungsten toothpaste.” Senku responded confidently, as if that actually answered anything. Gen nodded sagely and smiled overly brightly.
“Yeah, uh huh, cool. And we do that by…”
“Heating the jewel with sodium peroxide, crystalizing it, and then adding honey to make it into a paste we can use.”
“Oh, yeah, okay, awesome, wow, makes sense” Gen nodded a little faster, waiting for Senku to pick up on his sarcasm. “And I’m here because….”
“Because you’re going to help me.”
“Sweet, yeah, okay. And I’m going to do that by…”
“Sitting over there.” Gen stopped nodding and narrowed his eyes at the scientist at the other end of the table, already too enthralled in his work to notice anything Gen was doing.
“And that’s helping how?”
“Did I forget to mention that ‘quietly’ was an important part of the helping aspect?”
“No you didn’t menti- Wait no don’t change the subject. How is me sitting here hel-”
“Shhhhhh,” Senku finally looked up at Gen from across the table with a wide grin, his shoulders shaking with barely restrained laughter. “Quietly.”
“What the fuck, Senku,” Gen whispered, but Senku was already immersed in his work again. Gen watched him work for a moment, admiring the other’s intense focus and reveling in finally having a moment alone with Senku, despite the fact that the other was working intently and he was just… well… sitting there.
After a while though, Gen could feel his patience waning and felt his fingers start to itch with the need to do something. He leaned forward against the table, stretching out his arm as far as he could reach and poking lightly at the nearest beaker of liquid, watching is slosh against the side of the glass container. Once the contents had settled back down to calm, he nudged it again and tapped his nails against the glass a few times to break the silence filling the lab. He watched the liquid settle and once again reached out to push on the beaker.
When it didn’t budge, Gen glanced up without lifting his head from the table to see Senku’s hand holding the top edge of the beaker, the man himself staring back at him with a stern look.
“There’s generally rules against messing with stuff in a chem lab.” Gen rolled his eyes in response and huffed a sigh.
“There’s probably rules against dragging men into chem labs against their will, but here we are,” he mumbled, sitting up straight and resting his head against his fist. After a few minutes of asking himself why he was there, and why he hadn’t just walked out yet, he zoned out, once again unabashedly staring at the scientist as he worked.
His thoughts wandered, as they often did when he was left alone a little too long, to his life before the whole petrification epidemic. To the world that, no matter how much Senku managed to recreate, would never truly come back.
No matter what happened, he and Senku would always be two people out of their element. Two people without a real home.
But maybe, just maybe, Senku would be able to rebuild a society close to the one they knew. Maybe even a society that would surpass the one they knew.
If anyone could do it, Gen thought, it would be Senku.
He just hoped that they would get around to evolving the food part of society sooner rather than later. Speaking of…
“I don’t remember if I ever got the chance to thank you for the cola, Senku,” Gen broke the silence that had fallen over them. Senku smiled, but didn’t look up from the slowly bubbling mixture he was stirring.
“Don’t mention it. Had to get you over to science’s side somehow.” Gen chuckled under his breath and started drawing unseen figures on the table with the tip of his finger, needing to do something with his hands more than anything.
“Well, thank you anyways.”
“Hmm. If you ever want more, just let me know.”
“You’re a pretty good person, huh Senku?”
“Yeah, but don’t tell anyone. It’ll ruin my reputation.” Gen laughed a little louder and Senku looked up from his mixture through his lashes to glance at Gen with a crooked smile.
Silence descended on the lab again, but didn’t last long before Gen broke it once again.
“What about you, Senku? Any food or anything in particular you miss from our world?”
“Our world?” Senku asked teasingly. “You make it sound like we’re on mars or something.”
“Okay fine. Anything that you miss from our time?” Gen corrected, voice dripping with sarcasm. Senku chuckled and poured another liquid that Gen didn’t dare try to guess what it was into the heated mixture.
“Not really,” he replied without looking it up. “I could go for some actual good ramen, that’s for sure. Would have liked to have seen how the show I was following ended, I guess. But hey,” he shrugged and pressed his lips into a tight line, “what can you do?”
“What indeed,” Gen whispered, barely loud enough for Senku to hear. Senku nodded, more out of reflex to hearing someone else’s voice than in actual response. Gen watched him for a moment, but could tell that he was once again fully immersed in whatever he was doing.
What was it again? Tongue… something? Something with toothpaste? Tongue paste? That didn’t sound right. Well, whatever. Science something or other.
Gen stood up from the stool Senku had set him as quietly as possible, trying his best not to disturb the other man. He walked around the edge of the lab slowly, eyeing the various liquids and powders that Chrome and Senku had collected and created over the past few months.
He admired the collection, losing himself in a jumble of thoughts of Senku and science and toothpaste. He paused in front of a beaker filled with a thick black sludge and tapped the glass gently, quickly forgetting Senku’s previous warning. When the sludge didn’t move in the slightest, he lost interest and moved onto the next bottle over.
The sound of Senku clearing his throat made Gen jump a few feet in the air, whipping around quickly to look at Senku with wide eyes as he tried to calm down his now racing heart. Gen was beginning to think that Senku wasn’t actually trying to get his attention until a minute later, when Senku actually spoke.
“Um, I haven’t really had a chance to talk to you since the other day. But I, uh, I wanted to say thank you,” he said without looking away from his work, “for the birthday. And the gift. And, well, I guess just everything.” He laughed quietly, nerves clearly starting to get the best of him. “Sorry. I’m not great with the whole feelings things.”
“Really? I never would have guessed.” Senku glanced up quickly to stick his tongue out at Gen before returning to his work, a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. “But seriously Senku,” Gen continued once his laughter had died down, “there’s no need to thank me. It’s the least we could do – that I could do – after everything you’ve done for us.” Senku shook his head and furrowed his brow, whether at the mixture in front of him that was bubbling a bit harder now or at Gen’s response, Gen wasn’t sure.
“Why though? I don’t- I can’t wrap my head around it. Like, why? Why me?” Senku pressed his hands against the table and finally really looked up from his work, confusion clear in his eyes as he stared at Gen from across the lab. Gen stared back in silence for a minute, taking a second to appreciate the fact that even the great Senku could be confused by something before refocusing on the question.
“Seriously, Senku? Don’t tell me you don’t see everything you’ve done for the people in this village. For society as a whole. You’re rebuilding a modern world from basically nothing.”
“Yeah, but it’s not like I’ve been doing it alone or anything.”
“Sure, you haven’t been doing it alone, but you’ve had to teach all of us to get us to the point that we could help you. Not only have you been rebuilding society, but you’ve been teaching what you know to everyone at the same time. Just look at everything you’ve done for Chrome. Look at how far he’s come thanks to you. For fuck’s sake, Senku, you saved Ruri’s life. How could these people not love you?
“Plus, everything you’ve done for me. You trusted me and put your faith in me when you probably shouldn’t have. You accepted me into your team – your family – when you still couldn’t have been sure that I wouldn’t betray you to Tsukasa. You- You took time out of saving the world to make me a stupid bottle of cola.” Gen paused to suck in a deep breath and looked down at the table nervously before pressing on.
“The other night. I wasn’t kidding about what I said, even if it is gross. When I first saw that date carved into stone outside the cave, I was fascinated by you. I needed to meet the person capable of keeping count of the passing seconds for over a thousand years. Like, seriously, what the fuck was that?
“And then I finally met you. And every day is something new. Every day, you do something that amazes me even more than I thought possible. Every day, I- I think I love you a little more.” Gen looked up from the table to see Senku still watching him, his expression relaxed and open with surprise, but his brow was still furrowed with a little bit of confusion.
“Why the observatory though?” His voice came out carefully, barely above a whisper. If it was anyone else, Gen would assume he was trying to keep it from shaking with too much emotion. “You guys basically built an entire building for me. That’s- That’s way too much.” Gen smiled softly and shook his head, looking back down at the table again.
“It’s not too much. In fact, I would say it’s still not enough. There’s no way that that could even come close to showing you how much you matter to us. To me.”
“What could?” Gen’s head snapped up at the question. At some point, Senku had taken a few steps closer, making his voice louder than Gen had been expecting. The confusion was gone and his brow had smoothed, his expression now more nervously excited than anything else. Gen felt nerves building in his own chest, but his feet started moving before he could think twice.
He slowly rounded the corner of the table and stopped to stand directly in front of Senku, close enough that their toes were almost touching. Senku didn’t even so much as lean back a fraction of an inch in response to the close proximity. Gen raised his hand, pushing a piece of Senku’s hair behind his ear and pressing his open palm against Senku’s cheek. He leaned forward another inch and pressed his forehead to Senku’s, watching for any negative reaction from the other, any sign that he needed to back off. Instead, all he felt was Senku pressing further into his touch. Encouraged by the response, Gen took a steadying breath and smiled nervously.
“Maybe this can,” Gen whispered, not waiting for an actual response before closing the distance between them and pressing his lips to Senku’s.
At first, it was nothing more than an awkward, stiff press of lips. But after a few seconds, during which Gen nearly started to full out panic, wondering if he had misread the whole situation, Senku wrapped his arms around Gen’s waist and pulled him in closer, pushing forward slightly and deepening the kiss. In response, Gen wrapped his arms around Senku’s neck, threading one hand into Senku’s hair at the back of his head. Gen felt like he could lose himself in the feeling of having Senku pressed against him and his hand on his hips, but unfortunately the need for air eventually broke them apart.
Gen pulled back from the kiss, breathing hard, and pressed his forehead to Senku’s again. Senku gave him a soft smile and Gen couldn’t stop the elated giggle that slipped past his lips. Senku’s smile widened in response to the sound and he pressed forward for another quick kiss. When they broke apart, Senku nosed at Gen’s cheek, turning Gen’s head so he could press kisses along Gen’s jaw. Gen hummed his approval, but seeing the lab table snapped him quickly back to reality. Gen shrieked and pushed Senku away quickly, turning to point at the long forgotten beaker of paste.
“Fuck, Senku! The tongue paste!” Senku stared at Gen in confusion for a moment, obviously still trying to catch up to the sudden change in mood.
“What did you just call it?”
“You know! The- The tongue paste or whatever it was. Is it okay? Is it still useable?” Senku glanced between the beaker of paste and Gen a few times before snorting and letting out a full-bodied laugh.
“Oh, that’s been done for like, an hour now. I just didn’t want you to leave, so I didn’t tell you.” Gen stared at Senku in shock for a moment before joining in on his laughter.
“That’s some masterful plan you had there, Senku.”
“Hmm, well I am a genius after all.”
“True. I guess I shouldn’t expect any less from you.” Gen casually leaned back against the edge of the lab table, careful to not lean too close to any of the bottles and beakers that Senku had left on the table after finishing his experiment. Senku closed the gap between them, placing his hand on the counter right next to Gen’s hip, and leaned in close again.
“Can we talk about what you called the experiment?”
“I mean we could. Or,” Gen brushed his fingertips against Senku’s chest, slowly dragging them upwards until they were once again tangled in Senku’s hair, “we could do something more productive with our time.”
“Such as?” Senku’s voice came out a little breathier than usual as he leaned in even closer, his nose brushing against Gen’s.
“Literally anything else in the world.” Senku laughed and finally closed the distance, stealing Gen’s breath and leaving him boneless, leaning against the edge of the table. “How much time do you think we have before we have to rejoin the rest of the group?” Senku hummed and pressed a kiss to Gen’s cheek.
“A few hours, at least,” he murmured against Gen’s cheek, moving down to nose at Gen’s jaw and press a kiss below his ear. “Why?”
Gen unwound his arms from around Senku’s neck and placed his palms flat against the table behind him. He gracefully hoisted himself up to sit on the edge of the table, immediately reaching out to pull Senku in closer as soon as he was situated.
“Just curious,” Gen replied, already pulling Senku into another kiss. “What ever could we do with a few hours alone in the lab?” Gen asked in an overly innocent voice, batting his eyelashes up at Senku for good measure. Senku pulled back, excitement burning behind his eyes. He opened his mouth to respond, but Gen quickly slapped his hand over the other’s mouth before he could say anything.
“Senku, I swear to god if you say ‘science’ right now, I will leave this lab right now.”