Let’s Perform Our Favorite Little Scene (Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh)
Alternate Title: Easy Steps in Making Senpai Notice You
It was intentional, when the video was posted on Facebook.
It was Helix’s own fault. Had Watermelon been around to hear him admit to that, the redhead would have snorted his ‘of-course-it-is-your-fault’ snort in Helix's general direction.
But as implied, WM was not here.
And his absence was, as mentioned, Helix’s fault.
It started with a rumour circulating around their campus regarding a certain out-of-town science convention. The Camp, it was called, was founded on the idea that if you lock up enough number of mad scientists in a confined space, they would either come up with the next milestone of scientific discovery, or gemma-radiate themselves into a group of superheroes. Either way, somebody thought that the idea was brilliant and that somebody was rich enough to fund it.
And so it was funded.
Helix has been excited for the event for weeks, bouncing up and down talking about it to anybody who still care about listening to him (note: Not Watermelon). The personal invitation came into the mail for both him and the redhead almost as soon as people starting talking about it. The Golden Ticket, some called it, cover all expenses both imaginable and unimaginable.
Finally, being the finest minds of their nation was worth something.
Helix dubbed this trip the 'honeymoon period' for him and WM- the week where they would be working side by side, sciencing it up, procreating their lovechild of an invention…..
Of course those are the exact wording he used in his letter to Lucianna and Sigmoid.
The reply came to him a day later. And just because Lucianna is, in the most endearing way, an absolute slut for dramatizing, the email was kept short.
You and your ginger are not the only smart ones, it said. Completed with the attachment of invitation to The Camp, addressed to Miss Lucianna Michaels and Mr. Simon Wells.
Just like that, Helix flipped the fuck out.
"Holy shit," he whispered, after he had somewhat gathered himself. "Holy- WM, you're meeting Simon and Lucianna."
And because it was so easy to succumb to excitement, Helix squealed like a little girl.
It has been a year, there had been countless letters between them. There were always letters, and may be because of that sometimes it was easy to forget that he actually miss Sigmoid and Parabola.
Now that there were days to count down, it felt like it has been too long since he’s seen them.
Above all the excitements, Helix dreaded it too. Just a little. Because it won't be just him catching up with his Parabola and Sigmoid. It would be him and WM meeting Lucianna and Simon. All the scenarios he cooked up inside his own head was enough to make him shit bricks if that was even humanly possible.
It was a walk on high-wire, this whole thing. If this went wrong, he crashes and burns- quite literally on the crashing part if this whole hypothetical rope-walking wasn’t a metaphorical walk in the first place.
But if, a reasonably probability of an if, if he does not fuck this up.
It would be fucking fantastic.
Helix was so ready for this. For The Camp, the nerves, the excitement, the plane ride, the car ride to the airport, this whole thing. He was so ready for everything when WM said to him that he isn't coming.
Helix gaped.
“You heard me.”
The redhead delivered his line calmly, green eyes behind the reading lens still scanning the paper on the desk.
Helix blinked once, twice. “What do you mean you’re not going?”
They were suppose to leave to the airport, in the next five- ten minutes, if they push it. Helix had a backpack sling over right shoulder, ready to walk out the door at an moment. WM was without anything of shape, size and dimensions that resemble a luggage, which Helix really should have taken that as a red flag a night ago. Instead, Helix ask him if he was ready to make the trip.
Which was precisely when WM told him he would not be coming.
The redhead looked up from what he was reading, broken away from his ‘zone’ and into the real world where, slowly, it would be registered to him that Helix is being a pest. “It means I’m not going to your little camp.”
“But I thought- Sigmoid and Parabola is going to be there- we talked-.” Words fell out of his mouth, Helix alternated his glance between his roommate and the time on Hello Kitty Clock. “What the fuck, Watermelon?”
“You talked. You didn’t ask.“ WM said coolly, “I didn’t say I would go.”
So there it was, Helix's fault.
His ‘fault’. Because despite all the lunatic blabbering he has done, all the implications of how important this whole deal was for him, it was Helix's own faults to assume WM would come along easily with his plan without him having to verbally ask.
Because he had assumed WM wouldn’t be so heartless, wouldn’t act so stupid.
It was the game they play, WM skirting around the what was upsetting him, quietly sulking, never tell Helix when he was being an idiot just so it would all crash down on him in the most unexpected moment. The guy conveyed his displeasure in a fucking Da Vinci code of a body language and expected Helix to notice.
When he forgot to do dishes- when he didn’t come back in time for dinner- when he didn’t know WM would be home waiting for him on Christmas. The redhead never said anything, just quietly waited to be furious, expected to be disappointed. And it’s one time too many they played this game. Helix was too drained, too desperate to be angry.
All those fears about WM and his friends not getting along, turned out Helix thought too far ahead.
“I’m sorry,” was all he could muttered. “I’m sorry I assume you would just come. But I really want you to meet Lucianna and Simon, I want them to meet you. We still have time if you pack now….”
It was only a week, shove a few pairs of clean underwear and formal clothes into the bag and we can buy the rest when we landed, was what Helix meant to ramble on. WM cut him short.
“I can’t miss my labs.”
And Helix can’t miss his flight. Watermelon was impossible to deal with when he sulked. That was the end of the conversation.
Instead of dealing with him then and there, once and for all, five hours after he landed Helix let Lucianna posted the video on his Facebook wall.
.
It was The Last Resort.
'The Last Resort' was the plan Helix executed after ‘Leave As Much Voicemails As He Physically Could’, didn't work. He executed that one during the drive to the airport. Had a restless sleep on the plane. And once he landed, he was forced to use the more desperate measure of ‘Begging Watermelon Through His Sister’.
Mistral McDonnell has been sympathetic, and perhaps a little uncomfortable, when he called. Nevertheless, she had promised to talk to WM for him.
Not ten minutes after he hung up, she called back and informed him that 'brother was very cross you used your phone while driving.' Nothing else to report. She was very sorry her brother decided not to make the trip.
And so Helix deemed it the time for The Last Resort.
.
Helix saw them as soon as he pushed the bungalow door open, crowding each other on the couch despite the three-people space it offered. Christain Bale was killing Jared Leto to Hip to be Square on the screen, and Lucianna and Sigmoid looked quite peaceful.
The two arrived at The Camp before Helix, what with the time difference and flight schedule. Lucianna checked them all under the same bungalow. The accommodation was suppose to hold five people each. With the absence of WM, it would just be Helix, Lu, Sigmoid and some poor sod who was doomed to be their fourthwheel.
Sigmoid and Lucianna had known, even before Helix boarded the plane, about the 'little misunderstanding' that happened between him and WM. So when they looked up at him for his entrance, he couldn't quite stop himself from giving them the most pathetic, sheepish smile.
In return, he received a snort from Lucianna. Sigmoid just kind of.... stared at him.
“He’s kind of a dick,” Sig finally offered. And that was it. That was all. No dramatic slow-motion of them jumping into each other’s arms. No heart-warming reunion scene with coming-of-age music playing in the background. Helix gave them a dry smile, Lu gave him a snort, Simon insulted his not-boyfriend.
Then they headed to the Orientation.
.
The opening event offered little to naught sciencing. They have been expecting this, but Helix can't say that he wasn't disappointed. Orientation night start off with wine and cheese and people bumping around introducing themselves to each other in accented English. Lucianna, who somehow managed to secure a glass of Martini in the strictly fermented-grapes-only event, waltz around the room in the royal demeanour, leaving Helix and bored-looking Sigmoid to trail after her.
"Excuse me, are you... are you Nicolas Oxford?" An uncertain voice came from behind the three of them. Lucianna turned back in a snap.
To the girl's credit, she did not run away from Lu's deadly glare. More of, she waited until Helix gave her an 'uh, yeah,' before honest-to-god trying to jump him.
"I need to talk to you about your paper." She said, hand reached out as if to touched him and stopped herself midway before it could happen. The action repeated itself as frantically as her words. "I mean, can I? I could buy you a drink.... I mean for later, after all these free wine they're giving us. I can't believe you're here. I mean, it makes sense... gosh, I'm saying 'I mean' a lot, ain't I?"
It took almost five minutes, because she had to tell him about how starstruck she was to have met him, and then tell him about how she has read every of his paper, and then start telling him that she doesn't believe a single thing the tabloid has to said about the exploitation he had done in his youth. At this point, Helix just stood there scratching the tip of his nose, unable to do anything other than feeling more exhausted than ever.
In the end it was Lucianna who simply walked away from them, Sigmoid followed her. Helix took that as his cue to grin at the overly-excited girl and told her he has to go.
"I can't believe people haven't forget." Lucianna said to him accusingly- which... Helix really failed to see how this is his fault. "You can't be that fam-"
"Hey, aren't you that guy who wrote the paper on quantum statistical properties of radiation?"
"-mous. God fucking damn it."
Helix beamed at Lucianna, then replied a little too smugly to the inquirer, "and many other wonderful things. Pleasure to meet you." He completed that with a little mocking bow.
"Cool," he cocked his head to a side, as if in deep thought. Then added, "I heard you fucked a lot of celebrities." And left.
Lucianna's grin was positively demeaning.
"That sums it up, doesn't it, that guy who wrote that paper and fucked a bunch of celebrities." Helix muttered, "I'm way too calm for this. Do you think I'm in shocked?"
Simon shrugged. Lucianna refused to shut her her goddamn smile. Life goes on.
It was not after they met three more eager 'fans' that the realisation drawn on them that everybody in The Camp knows Helix. Or at least know of him. If not by his name then definitely his face from the countless scoops of his glamorous young life.
Lucianna's scowl turned into a subtle hidden expression of sympathy. Sigmoid's composure started cracking. The longer time ticked by, the closer the two of them plastered themselves next to Helix's side.
Helix felt a little like he's being escorted out of the pub after getting caught underage-drinking. He's also more than a little grateful for his friends.
For the first time since this trip started, Helix was glad WM didn’t make it.
.
The actual program did not start until the next day and until then, everybody was free to do go wherever, do whatever and whomever they wish once they’re done with the dinner.
With some alcohol already in their system, most people skipped the dinner and headed to the pub.
'It's Wine and Cheese, Meet and Greet," some leery nerds was chatting Lucianna up earlier. Helix noticed how his eyes failed to leave the general area of her breasts as he added, 'Fine Dinin’ and Grindin, you up for it?’
She skipped the dinner and jump ahead to shots.
Sigmoid had not expect Helix to abstain from all intoxication. But after the... wide recognition he received, he did expect Helix to at least tried to be discreet in his drinking habit.
Matching Lucianna shots to shots was not, in Sigmoid's definition, a discrete act.
He glared at Lucianna.
"The ‘No, Helix’ing isn’t my job,” she said almost defensively, then signalled the bartender for three more shots. "You do it."
So much for the subtlety. He thought, refocused his eyes back to Helix, managed to sound as unimpressed as he was feeling when he said, "really? This is what you're doing? Are you-"
“-of legal age to consume alcohol without parental supervision? Why yes.” Helix responded, knocking his shot glass on Lucianna's, spilling both their alcohol in the process. “You can run my card.”
“You’d be surprised when you see the number on there," Lucianna chimed in, throwing back her drink dutifully. "Can't really tell from the level of immaturity and amount of pining he's been doing."
Helix faked a pained grasp at that. Hands clutching on his heart, he moaned, "your words are all knifes and daggers, Lu. The deepest pit of my soul- the furthest, most vulnerable part of my heart, you've hurt it. And now it's weeping like a child."
"Only reaffirming my point, Oxford.”
“Then it was my pleasure to be of assistance, Miss Michaels.” Helix sighed ruefully, then clinked his newly filled shot glass with her in solemn manner.
Sigmoid was seriously contemplating catching up with them on the number of shots. Looking at all the empty glasses in front of him, he tried to remember if this was a first place he’s been to that serves shots of vodka in real, heavy glass rather than those flimsy plastic cup.
Looking around, he wondered if the resort should have opted for those cheap alternatives for a night.
“Alcoholism is a real problem, you know?” He said, while single out a cigarette from his pack, started knocking the filtered side on the wooden counter.
"Oh, please. I'm switching to cocktail after this one," Lucianna drawled, then lazily pointed at Helix. "He's getting more shots, though."
Helix grinned, "I'm a man with pending mission."
"Whatever that means." Sigmoid murmured, still can't decided if he actually wants to know whatever that means.
"My mission," Helix said, raising his glass- "The Last Resort." -knocked it down.
"Saying that in ominous voice won't raise any suspense on my part." Simon said, "neither would speaking like Yoda."
"Get WM to come over, I think I can," Helix countered in slightly raised voice. Then smiled brightly at him. "This, dear Simon, is how you speak like Yoda."
Lucianna gave a snicker, but she was as interested as he was if her shifted glance tells him anything. She sneered, "drinking yourself to death so he would come to your funeral?"
"Funeral comes after," Helix said easily. "I have to get him pissed enough to come over and kill me first."
Somewhere within earshot, he heard a sound of glass smashing followed by a yelled, 'ANOTHER!', confirming his initial concern.
Simon was now more worried about the fact that he understood that old-age movie reference.
"Or, you know, get him to worry. WM have the paternal instinct of a mama bear," Helix added. "If I fuck up badly enough, he'd be all over me."
“Do you guys ever just talk to each other?” Asked Lucianna, reaching out to collect the empty shot glasses to stack them into tower.
“We have sex.”
"Not for a week, you're not."
"Why must you be so rude?"
The conversation digressed after that. They picked up from where the last letter left off as if there was never a delay between then and now. The bar got rowdier by the later hours, the regular resort guests finally gave in to the colonisation by university students- there were nothing in the 'verse to stop them.
"I never understood the stereotype that nerds don't know how to party," Lucianna mused, looking at a kid who looked way too young to even be allowed to leave his crib climbing up the music stage and declaring it his by threatening to pee on it. "These guys would chug down a pint of gasoline and came out even stronger." He picked up a microphone and, again, threaten to pee on the stage if the resort staff doesn't turn on the sound system.
The karaoke went on in full swing after that. The three of them observed the commotion with condescending silence. Because they've lived that scene way too young and now feel nothing but detachment towards it.
Or not.
After observing the stage for five songs, Helix finally got up from his stool. It would be more accurate to say he fell off of it but picked himself up quickly enough to not be too embarrassing. "I'm about to do something very, very stupid," he announced.
Words that would have came off in better tone had it been said by an old western movie star. Instead, it came out of Helix's mouth as a slur as he swayed left and right pinballing into everybody in his path...
...heading to the karaoke stage.
Lucianna, stoic in her intoxication, did nothing to stop him. So sigmoid took it in his stride to go after Helix.
Trying to get off the high stool resulted in him almost crashing his face to the expensive wood floor. From above him, there was a snicker from Lucianna.
“No shit,” he bit back at her.
When he managed to straighten himself, Helix had already made it to his destination. He beamed blindingly at them from across the room as he shouted into the microphone, “don’t forget to take video!”
From that point on, the worst secondhand-embarrassment Simon has ever experience commenced.
.
Mistral called Helix in the morning.
Helix was already up, though with great difficulty. His first workshop started in ten minutes and Helix was still drunk enough to not feel his hangover. There might be some hope left for him to make his entrance to the workshop as dignified as possible.
“…’llo?” He said into the silence at the other side of the line. Mistral had said nothing since he picked up.
“Oh,” Mistral sounded as if she was jolt of her thought. “I’m sorry, Helix. I’m just not sure what to say.”
“Are you alright?”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
“Did your brother tell you to call?”
There was a pause.
“Yes,” she admitted meekly. “He was concerned.”
In his head, Helix dropped to his knees with tears streaming down his face and praised the cosmic intervention that allowed his plan to come to fruition. In the world of living, though, he cracked the most obscene, most sinister grin.
“Did he say he was coming?”
"Helix,” her voice came up louder than usual, filled with distress “Did you consent the video being posted?”
Helix blinked.
Oh.
So it seemed that instead of riling up just one McDonald, he got another one worrying after him.
A quick warmth spread through his chest, a hard tug at certain string inside of him. It left behind those odd, cooling feelings. Not the shivering winter chill but rather the taste of peppermint candy or freshly made lemonade soda in hot August afternoon.
Not that Helix was antiquated with those taste and feeling, but it was what he imagined the feeling to equated.
For a moment, he forgot about all- the plan he has been cooking up, the absence of a certain redhead and the hangover that starting to creep up on him along with the sobriety.
He simply thought, that he was entirely enamoured with this girl.
"Don't worry about it, Princess." He smile softly, "I know what I'm doing."
“Do you know what has been posted on your Facebook?”
Helix could not give her an affirmation on that without giving a lie. He vaguely remember what he did. The drunken rendition of Miss Moving On- his high notes would put the gremlin to shame and he messed up half of the lyrics. He hope it was his just imagination he sang to a plate filled with bite-size watermelon (it's what he felt a clever symbolism looks like at a time).
He had no intention of revisit the video to find out how it actually went down.
“Don’t worry about me.” Helix said, “give your brother my love.”
Mistral would surely pass that along. Watermelon would be so pissed.
And because that simply would not be enough, after Helix hung up from Mistral, he posted a Facebook status saying: Don’t accept an experimental hangover remedy from the biologist, you’d think you have already throw up all your guts but there would be more.
It didn't even took him long to come up with that one, he made it to the workshop just five minutes after it has started.
.
That night, when his gang have sufficiently recover from the nagging hangover, at the Hour Not Too Late But Early Enough To Imply Alcoholism, Lucianna posted “It’s your turn to hold his hair if he throw up again.” on Sigmoid’s Facebook wall.
“You forget to tag him,” Sigmoid called from the front door, plastic bags filled with the still fuming Chinese takeout in one hand, the other scrolling through his notification feed. “The guy wouldn’t see it if it’s not on Helix’s wall.”
“Isn’t it too strange, anyway, to post this on Facebook when we’re supposedly drinking together.” Lucianna says without looking up from the screen, fingers tap away to what Helix assume to be tagging him in her recent post. “I don’t do this.”
“We want to rat him out, publicly humiliate him, allegedly.” A shrug from Simon. “People do it all the time, I don’t think anybody’s gonna question it.”
“If he really wanted Red come running, he could have checked in at some strip club.”
“You don’t know Watermelon, he sulk when he’s jealous.” Helix said as he snatched the plastic bag off Sigmoid’s grip. "Did you order chow mien? WM never let me have that. He says it's too much carbs."
The post built up Likes quickly, presumably an act of solidarity from people who actually went out drinking tonight. Sigmoid typed a reply to the post tagged to him (think we need to hire him a babysitter. how did he manage to survive this long), after much thought.
Watermelon would be tearing a pillow into half when he reads that.
“I see that you truly understand him, which is why- Simon, grab me a bottle too- which is why you opted for manipulating him into running after you rather than call him up and apologize.” Their phones buzzed at the same time, Cindy Walker commented on the post you’re tagged in: Isn’t he suppose to be inventing time machine over there?
“I will tell you when he picks up my call.” Simon Wells commented on the post you’re tagged in: Science might not sleep, but out of office hrs we drink.
"You guys are ridiculous." Sigmoid said as he peered into the fridge.
"It's Helix that is ridiculous," Lucianna corrected him. "Red is just a little hysterical."
"The make-up sex is ridiculously good," Helix grinned. "It's phenomenal. Trust me, it's all worth it."
All three of them sat down around the dining table, peering down at their phone. For a moment there was absolute silence. Soft blue glow bathed their stern feature painted the picture as if they're saying grace. Finally, Lucianna tossed her phone on the table in dismissal and grab the box of takeout nearest to her.
“So,” she started as her fingers worked their way in peeling off the paper lid. The smell of under-seasoned consumable form of racism filled the entire room, bringing back some sort of nostalgia. After years of living with WM, Helix almost forget how inspiringly awful these noodles can be. “Are we having fun?”
"Sure," Sigmoid replied, apparently accepting Cindy's friend request.
Helix, who was allegedly already blackout drunk, stabbed his plastic fork on overcooked single prawn amongst sea of soggy noodle, it was rubbery and devoid of taste. He looked up to his friends, and said. “Let’s watch Star Trek.”
.
By morning, Helix admitted to himself that the bait didn't work.
He didn't hear from Mistral, didn't get words from the Fruit Gang. He resigned on working harder on being self-destructive, making notes and plans in his head.
But when it finally happened, it entirely wasn't meant to be. It was just an unintentionally incident, the beautiful, marvellous, 'the universe love him and wants him to bone Ran McDonnell' chance.
The Unintentional came in a form single photo of his team being posted on The Camp official Facebook page.
Stacks of blueprints and papers occupying every working space of theirs. Cans of energy drinks, sponsored by The Camp, of course, both whole and crushed scattered around the table, leaving stained of sweet syrup on every surface it touched.
Some of the uncrushed can of energy drinks have Red Vine stuck in it, serving purpose of being the most awesomest straw ever (not his words). Sure, some of the candy was left there limbless and half-bitten in the saddest way anybody could ever imagine red licorice to be sad. It only added to the effects.
Helix was knocked out on the keyboard, drooling a little as his right hand laid on the mouse and his left clutched tight on the handle of two coffee pots. Next to him, Lucianna had her legs drawn on the chair, both her knees probed against the edge of table, chair lifted off the floor a little. From the outsider's perspective, it must have seem like she was only closing her eyes for a few second- catching a little break.
But the fact was that between the three of them, it was only Sigmoid who was still awake. He can be seen on the far off corner of the picture, the reading glasses fell too low on the bridge of his nose, one hand reached out for the pyramid of sugar cubes. His eyes were glossy and unfocused, unaware that the picture was being taken.
The Camp dauntlessly captioned the picture: two men down after 52th hours, how long can you go without sleep?- no fear of getting sued for overworking minors.
When Helix woke up, there was a text.
'Don't go out tonight. Get some proper fucking sleep -WM'
He let out the most hysterical, satisfied laugh. It startled Lucianna to wake just seconds before her chair toppled and she crashed to the ground. And Helix could just laughed.
How about that.
.
"So it worked," Helix announced, throwing his phone on the table for Sigmoid to see. Lucianna was still on the floor, just a mess of sprayed limps and confusion. "WM was furious." Then he put his both hands to his face, attempted to look like a blushing maiden, "he texted me to get some sleep."
Sigmoid glanced over his reading glasses, spared him a glance before turning to Lucianna.
"Can you check my calculations?" He called out offhandedly to the girl who was collecting herself while going ow, ow, what the fuck, ow. "At this rate, we could assemble the pieces tomorrow and do the test drive in about two days time."
"We could assemble it now, test it tomorrow." Lucianna said, now up on two feet but still looking slightly confused. "Helix's probably ran out of ideas to piss Red off, anyway. So it's about time."
"Awww, Lu, you do ca-"
"Just shut up." She snapped, still massaging the back of her head.
If it surprised Sigmoid that Lucianna was so invested in Helix's scheme, he didn't mentioned it. Instead, he checked the calculation, passed it over to Lucianna to see them over and finally hand it to Helix for the final equation-proof.
"You think this is gonna work?" He asked quietly.
"If it doesn't, I'm jumping off the bridge next."
"I'm asking about the indestructible car we're making," Simon said, somehow offended. "You're such a tool."
.
Between the assembling of their project, Helix posted a photo of the charcoaled microwave- his charcoaled microwave on Facebook.
The caption read 'It's science if you write it down. It's also science if The Camp insurance covers it.'
There was no calls nor texts from WM.
But Helix was aiming for something bigger, anyway.
.
Between promising the engineering majors some unthinkable favours in exchange of their help on Helix's group project (how ridiculous was it that they have three theoretical experts on the team and none can build) and recalibrating his calculations, Helix made sure to keep up with his builds up.
He spread rumours. There were words about him getting arrested for DUI (this part was not true), and a vague Facebook status of him thanking Pitaya for introducing him to the 'connection' (neither was this part). There were rumours about him getting severe cold from skinning dipping in almost minus degree (this part was partially true), and him getting arrested again for public exposure (so was this part).
Helix's Facebook page hasn't been so active for years.
WM, for once, took up a saintly patience and return none of his calls or texts.
The redhead's ego must have took a sizable amount of damage when he shoot Helix the first text two days ago.
Between then and now, Helix made it a point to not get a wink of sleep. He did it effortlessly; attended all the panels, accepted all the free energy drinks, reviewed the notes from conference when he isn't needed in the workshop, accepted all those shady pills from the medics and made sure to never make eye contact with those said medics.
And just like that, two days passed. Their project completed for now. Completed until they test it and take down the result and have to do everything all over again with a slight change in detail.
The curse of being a scientist.
"We're live," Lucianna called from where she was sitting, eyes tracking the increasing number of viewers dutifully. "Everybody we needed is logged in. Are you ready?"
Behind the wheel, Helix gave her a thumb-up completed with a grin. It was Sigmoid, who was sat beside her, that asked uneasily, "don't you think we are overdoing it?"
"Have faith in your own calculation, Simon, and stop shaking your legs." Lucianna replied nonchalantly. "The idiot wanted this, we comply"
"Is Red even watching?"
"Helix's quite confident he is, either an extreme case of narcissism or our boy's obsession is reciprocated and he knows it." Lucianna said thoughtfully, then added, "we will see after the crash."
Sigmoid stood up and faced the camera, he explained about the impact-absorbing material they have been working on for The Camp project and how they had layered the whole goddamn car with the material. He rambled a little about the theory behind it and how the calculation came to be. Finally, he turned to Helix, and gave a slight nod.
No other signal needed, Helix grinned widely,then took his feet off the brake, slammed the gas pedal, and ran himself into the concrete wall.
.
Helix felt his body shot forward with great force, then momentarily halted before the seatbelt tugged him back as the airbag inflated in his face.
His whole body jackknifed, it felt as if somebody stomps on his guts with combat boots. He knew an impressive bruise would start blooming there, soon after. Even so, the small fact that he was still alive proved the experiment to be successful- the fact that he was still quite conscious and received no broken bones (he thinks?) proved that all their calculations were right on track.
Still hurt like a bitch, though.
Outside his car, he heard Sigmoid conclude the experiment. The car was not damaged beyond some dent that could be overlooked, he report. Unfortunately, it seems that the crash still inflict some damage to the driver. The alloy has not been able to absorb as much impact as we hypothesize. The team would arrange the second trial run after the appropriate improvement has been made on the material.
The unsaid implication was that Helix would, again, be behind the wheel for the second test. Helix would give Sigmoid a high-five if he wasn't trying to subdue the pain in his general upperbody.
There was a knock on the car window, Lucianna was behind it, holding a buzzing phone in her hand for him to see. Her mouth read, "are you gonna take it?"
Helix tried to regulate his breath as he push the button to roll down the window. Tried hard to ignore the throbbing pain in his abdomen, he cranked out, "hey."
The reply came as a stream of curse, the foreign language of familiar voice, And Helix drank in how normal this is.
The rant ended quicker than he expected, and lo, it ended in English.
"...fucking kidding me. I refuse to be believe you just did that, you motherfucker."
"Watermelon?” Helix's voice was too hopeful even in his ears.
“No, you sod, it’s the bloody Pope. Your level of stupidity call for exorcising. What the fuck has gotten into you..."
Helix laughed, it hurt his ribs a bit. “Are you coming over?”
“… you need a fucking babysitter. You need a fucking keeper. Somebody to tell you when to sleep and when to shower. Someone to feed you and regulate your caffeine intake and fucking stop you from putting whatever shit you put in that microwave..."
“Watermelon”
“…and the fucking car, I swear...
“Please?”
There was a pause on the other end of the line, a slight panting. And Helix can't help but imagine WM. Angry WM. Concerned WM- watching his video, biting down his lips til it bleeds, overcoming his pride and finally picking up the damn phone, because after all, Helix is important enough for all that.
Important enough for the answer...
“Yes, I'm coming over. Go get some fucking sleep. You look like shit.”
.
Watermelon loomed over Helix, his body cast a sinister shadow over the blonde who remained asleep peacefully.
True to his order, Helix sleeps. Before he got here, WM was so angry he could feel blood boiling up in his vein. Now, though, all he can do was just to look at Helix- face slacked, all muscle loose and relaxed, just... asleep.
It was exactly what he told the idiot to do. But after 11 hours of speeding through motorway, the redhead can't help but feel a bit angry at how at peace the blonde look.
A few more minutes of brooding from WM's side, Helix stirred from his sleep- probably because he felt the instant where the air around him got positively murderous.
“Watermelon?” He called, slowly lifting his head from the pile of blankets that WM was hoping was choking him. "You're here," he beamed sleepily- the lazy, post-orgasmic sort of satisfaction, of someone who had slept fully.
Which WM did not.
He glared at the blonde, who after a few more moment of rubbing his face in the warmth of bedding, lifted himself up to face him. WM reached out, grabbed Helix by his neck, and crushed his lips against him.
Helix tasted like Red Bull and the 11 hours he slept off, it was the disgusting sort of sweetness, and WM drank it all up.
When he pulled apart, Helix was gasping for air a little, but his eyes shone with triumph.
The redhead ignored all that. Instead, he threw himself at the available space on the bed next to Helix. The redhead buried his face in the pillow and fall fast asleep. Leaving Helix, who was now awake, to look at him thoughtfully.
They are going to have a very serious talk later. WM would probably sulk, but it wouldn't matter, since he was here now. And after all is said and done, Helix would get him in good enough a mood, then he would introduce him to Sig and Lu.
And this trip would be just fucking fantastic.