Chapter Text
Gen hadn’t been sure what to do with the permission Senku gave him for Christmas, but in the end, he hadn’t had much chance to use it. The only real use he could have had of it without being a bother and ensuring he’d never get another offer was in the evening. He’d come up to Senku with dinner from the side while the scientist was talking to Kohaku and touched his shoulder to get his attention. Senku didn’t really startle, he’d clearly learned to mask whatever mild sensory issue he had very well, as was true of many high-functioning autistics. Because Gen was paying attention he saw how Senku’s whole body tensed, going still and stiff for a moment before he turned his head to see who it was with a slightly wooden expression. The smile when he saw that it was Gen was genuine and grew into gratitude as he took the bowl of food. It was almost seamless, and where he would have leaned away or shifted to regain his personal space with someone else - or even for Gen in their first life - Senku stayed where he was instead.
Gen could tell it still bothered Senku to be touched like that, and if they’d had the chance Gen would have liked to see if it was the same if he saw Gen coming. It didn’t feel like the sort of thing he should experiment with much in public, and they just didn’t have a good moment with only the two of them. Senku was busy with making plans using his new desk, explaining some of the concepts for how radio waves worked for Chrome as he did so, late into the evening Christmas Day.
Gen went ahead with his bedtime routine while they worked, which now included tending the fire in the stove. A big log would become slow burning coals to give a little warmth through the night, but without enough smaller chunks around it the big one would burn out before it burned away. Too much and it would burn faster and hotter, making the room too warm in the short term only to leave them shivering in the morning. Tending a fire was a tricky thing to learn, something Gen never had the chance to fiddle with enough to get a feel for it since he’d never had a fire that was his to tend. By the time Senku and Chrome called it a night, Gen had already used a damp cloth to freshen up, mixed a caffeine-free herbal blend for the morning, laid out both beds, and gotten comfortable under his blanket. The extra floor space vastly improved their quality of life.
He wasn’t sure how to feel about Ukyo coming for Christmas. Gen had been rather insistent that the older man learn to read the stars as a calendar just before Hyoga sent Gen ahead of him south, but he hadn’t really expected Ukyo to show up and be so bold about where he stood ideologically. He had hoped, but without expectation. It had all been so tenuous and while Gen knew what flipped Ukyo’s loyalty before, he didn’t know exactly when the archer had followed Yuzuriha and seen her repairing the statues. Gen did his best, not only to introduce Senku and the village people properly but also to explain why Gen stood so firmly on Senku’s side.
On Christmas morning Senku, showing off his remarkable memory by using something Gen mentioned once in August, apologized that they didn’t have any vegetarian options available short notice, and offered to have the cooks substitute fish instead of pork for Ukyo’s lunch. Most meals were prepped in bulk to reduce waste and with the harsh winter predicted they were being cautious since the nuts, beans, and grains last the longest in storage. That meant a lot to Ukyo, who had compromised his vegetarianism to include fish in order to survive when options were limited. In the other time line Ukyo gradually abandoned his old diet entirely, Gen wasn’t sure when he began eating goat and venison, but he did know peer pressure had as much to do with the final change as need. Maybe they would have enough resources for an easy accommodation this time, or at least to guarantee a vegetarian day once a week. Gen hoped their friendship hadn’t been damaged by Gen’s deceptions or that he’d obviously told Senku everything, and that Ukyo would still be there for them when it mattered.
Yet, he felt there had been something off about their interactions. A note of sadness under it all, that only deepened as Ukyo realized that Gen had been visiting Senku regularly throughout the summer without giving a single hint and currently had no intention of leaving the comfortable, welcoming home he found here.
Kaseki had insisted on firing up the kiln in the - well the Kingdom of Science’s main square might be the best way to start thinking of the place Senku’s house overlooked if they were going to build more around it - on Christmas day, which didn’t see as much use since they made the new one at the waterwheel. Ukyo had probably already seen the forge area, and would likely go give it a second look now that he knew it was generating electricity, but Senku didn’t have to show him around their best tech in detail and Kaseki wasn’t that trusting either. Gen had mentioned that glass items were often use as decoration on Christmas to the old man ages ago. Not that they were decorated functional things, but only a bit of art with little secondary value. Kaseki thought that was a bit too indulgent, but doing something artistic to a functional object was both a fun challenge and good gift in the Master Craftsman’s book. For the holiday, Kaseki wanted Gen to help him make a little melon shaped jar for Suika, which was a lovely idea. They ended up making a few delicate things, all of them doubling as jars, for several of the village women including Kohaku and Bibi.
Gen used some of the oxidized copper powder they had gathered from the forge during the cleanup to sprinkle some green into a bit of glass to color a rod they could use for accents. He remembered Senku talking about colored Christmas lights once, but Senku had talked himself out of it because the materials were better used in other ways. This was just a little bit of reclaimed dust, not enough for a whole string of colored lights. Then, Ukyo and a few of the villagers watched as Gen blew the basic shape out of clear glass. Kaseki shaped a vine and leaf out of the colored rod Gen made to disguise the flat bottom and make it easier to grip the lid. Kaseki cracked the melon around the top as it cooled, making what Gen would call a clear candy dish with a matching lid. The fading glow as it cooled revealed that Gen hadn’t mixed the copper oxide in very well and the color came out more aqua than green, but Suika liked the streaky blueish leaf and stem despite the flaws.
It was a pretty and fragile thing in a place and time where most things were rustic and tough. Gen suggested she use it for dried herbs or flower petals, or something else she wanted to keep dry and sheltered. Ukyo had to leave soon after Suika’s gift was cool enough to see the color of it properly. The holiday officially ended at noon according to what Senku said yesterday, so that was the end of the ceasefire. He collected his weapons from Titan and left peacefully, belly full of their best fish and cabbage stew.
Senku rolled right into making vacuum tubes after Christmas, and between that and the stoves already being done Gen was very happy at how far ahead of his first life they had gotten. It was a long slow road of progress, but introducing Senku to Kokuyo early so it wasn’t just Chrome, Kohaku, Kinro, and Ginro helping Senku get set up and supplied before the Grand Bout was really paying off.
The books Gen wrote and bound, one illustrated by Ishigami Senku, were also pushing things forward. Reading and writing might be a long-term investment, but the baby engineer book contained illustrated lessons Senku would have taught to Chrome and Kaseki one at a time over a year’s worth of projects that they could reference whenever they wanted. Aside from asking Gen or Senku to read the kana over and again in the beginning until they remembered all the names, the book of basics showing how mechanics transferred movement or multiplied force or power meant not having to stop to define a term midway through a project, which made things easier on Senku and kept the flow going for Kaseki and Chrome. Chrome was particularly interested in the screw, and reinvented the concept of a drill by imagining a big screw attached to the grinder while he was reviewing how they made the hearth in Senku’s home one evening over dinner. Gen was impressed and Senku was excited by Chrome’s inventive spirit. They were working faster and collaborating on a level that had taken much more time to reach in Gen’s first life. Gen being less work-shy now that he knew the effects of petrification meant that even if Gen couldn’t follow the science half the time, Kaseki still had two extra hands helping with the more repetitive aspects of the work. Gen being around more meant he could drop more hints for modern conveniences, and his month-long study session back in 2019 meant he knew more practical details to include in his hints.
There were days Gen wished he’d kept his lazy persona, but then Kaseki had always seen through him and Senku had mercilessly put him to work despite his complaints. Gen still cracked jokes about getting calluses on his delicate hands, but he laid off the ‘working me to exhaustion’ angle since Senku knew enough about Gen’s medical history to take that wrongly. “How can I maintain my celebrity standards with all this grueling work?” was the replacement phrase, with the chief complaint being too much filth and damage to his image rather than the hard work itself. It was also more instructive for Gen, with Kaseki explaining and coaching a willing helper far more instead of spending his time nagging Gen back on task. Not that Gen really wanted to become a craftsman, he was happy being a psychology expert, but it did make it a lot less boring.
The house was such a luxury compared to staying packed in with Chrome, better than what Gen had managed to get done before by an order of magnitude. The downspout Senku installed, a stopgap measure until the war was over, splashed down into a very short trench that banked the turn into another bamboo gutter to angle the runoff down the other side of the hill away from the main clearing and village, keeping things sanitary. On the top there was a slightly flared bit Gen would not call a funnel with a lid to keep any smells from blowing in the window. It was close enough to the base of the north window that it could be reached while kneeling, so Gen didn’t have to lean his upper body out the window while standing to pour wastewater into it, eliminating the risk of vertigo causing a dangerous fall. Senku scratched ‘open during rain’ into the lid. That was one way to flush it clean, though it would be a while before they had warm enough temperatures for a rainstorm that didn’t risk becoming an ice storm. A warm sponge bath next to the stove was a huge improvement to Gen’s personal comfort, and the hot water shouldn’t clog the pipe with ice easily. The second time Gen used it he noticed a bullseye painted on the inside of the flared opening and almost dropped the bathwater laughing. Male privilege, he supposed, but with Homura sneaking around the trees there was no way Gen was using it like that!
Chrome stayed with them about half the time. It was only fair with how he’d taken them in that they return the favor now that they had indoor heating, but Chrome also spent time in his own place or in the bachelor’s hut. Gen’s words to Ruri about Senku, Gen, and Chrome being outsiders in a very literal way of living outside the village had gotten around. The other guys seemed to realize how they’d driven Chrome away unfairly, and how rough it was for Chrome living all by himself. Argo and Titan made a point to drag Chrome off to stay with the other unmarried men in the village one evening. Jasper did it another time. Kinro and Ginro still stayed with their parents certain days of the week and stayed in the bachelor’s hut the rest of the time, and Gen was fairly certain that the days Chrome willingly went to sleep in the village correlated with being able to hang out with them. It seemed good for Chrome, in a lot of ways.
“You look happy,” Senku said. He sat down next to Gen by the stove. It was a particularly cold night as the second of January faded to make way for the third.
“Just a domino I poked back in early November resulting in some pieces falling perfectly into place,” Gen said cryptically.
“Well, now I need all the details,” Senku said, scooting a little closer.
“I wasn’t sure anything would come of it, but Chrome is hardly living in that storage hut Kaseki made for him at all anymore. That is how Kaseki calls it: always a storage space, not a house or Chrome’s place or Chrome’s home. Chrome himself doesn’t use the word home for that building, either. That is very telling, don’t you think? The village is home, the building he slept in was his place.”
“Yeah?” Senku prompted, he seemed surprised at the serious topic, straightening up curiously from a comfortable sprawl as his quick mind sifted through observed data to confirm. Gen was lounging with his own legs splayed out in front of him in a V. They’d both done a lot of meticulous work finishing the smaller fiddly parts of the radio guts all day, and Gen’s spine had been shrimp-shaped for far too long.
“I wonder how many years Chrome would have managed if we hadn’t come along, living out here. Not banished, but not welcome. He’s capable and cautious when it comes to basic survival skills, but you can’t outsmart an ice storm,” Gen said to the fire. “Even without my poking and prodding, there was a chance they would have apologized to him and welcomed him back to live with the other guys, or maybe he’d just stay with us, or we’d have stayed with him if this house wasn’t built.”
“You did for him the same thing you did for Kohaku,” Senku guessed. “Right?”
“I’d prefer if nobody said it to Chrome’s face that I had any involvement, he’d take it the wrong way. Worse than how Kohaku reacted to my meddling, and it would not be about how much he trusts and respects me, but a hit to his own self-worth.” Gen turned back to Senku, and the red-eyed scientist nodded. “It isn’t like he hasn’t earned his place in the village, and I don’t just mean his skills as an apprentice scientist. He provides nearly all the medicinal herbs Bibi uses, and is the best at finding difficult to locate resources including the way he maintains some of the patches of indigo plants the village uses. What I did just opened some eyes to an injustice they had been ignoring or rationalizing as something that made Chrome happier. As if anyone would be glad to be ostracized.”
“Yeah, I know,” Senku said, the huffed out a sigh. “I used that a bit, when I first got here. Both Chrome and Kohaku were in need of a solid friend and I needed, well, everything. She trusted me enough to help me and was curious enough about me to become a friend because I got her out from under that tree, but for Chrome it was mostly just listening to him and responding in kind. Nerding out with him a little and treating him half-decent was all it took to become his best friend.”
“Don’t say it like you were doing something bad or subversive,” Gen scolded. “It was genuine, still is, and if you got something out of it that’s just how humans work. Interpersonal relationships can be messy, but that give and take between close friends is normal.”
“I know, I’m just saying it started with a rather cold calculation,” Senku said.
“So did my relationship with him, and the little poke I used to ensure he’d have a warm place to sleep all winter no matter what,” Gen said, softening his voice to something gentle. “Since the three of us were roommates at the time, you can even say it was selfish.”
“Now you’re the one trying to spin a good deed into something evil-minded,” Senku said, then blinked away his cheeky grin. The progression from teasing to blank epiphany to pleased realization was quick, Senku’s mind didn’t know how to move slowly, but Gen’s ability to read people was up to the task. “Good job, mentalist.”
“It is, actually, quite difficult to notice your own patterns. Even the best-trained psychologist needs to talk to someone else to sort themselves out,” Gen said cautiously. “Or to find someone else that is their mirror, though that endeavor is fraught with its own perils.”
“Well, it’s all worked out well. We’ve got the difficult pieces of the phone project ready, we just have to make the housing and do some finishing work to ensure everything fits right before we start assembly. With the record Byakuya left playing to entertain the kids you’re free to focus more instead of having to split your attention babysitting. Singing and talking that much in the cold air hasn’t been good for your throat.”
That was an understatement. Gen’s singing had been a mostly private thing the first go around, but lots of people asked him to sing in the evenings or while working since Hyoga’s attack thanks to his earlier showing off. Lillian Weinberg’s voice was so much better than Gen’s. Her range, her control, how long she could sustain those belted notes, all of it was on another level, and now that Senku had the record people had stopped asking Gen to sing so often. His voice had gotten a little rougher recently, a side effect of the cold dry air, so it made sense they would prefer the nicer sound of the record. The rest was nice, and he understood that listening to their ancestor’s incredible talent was better than asking Gen to entertain them. There was no guilt in playing the glass record, either, where Gen could tell that the adults considered Gen singing in the evening a personal favor and the kids thought of it as repayment for working extra hard.
“I told them singing wasn’t one of the talents I was known for, but did they listen?” Gen said, putting on his silly facade.
“You have the best voice in the village,” Senku said, so matter of fact and blunt Gen couldn’t think of anything witty to say in rebuttal.
“If there isn’t anything left to worry about for the phones, then it’s time to solidify our plans for the vehicle,” Gen changed the subject, hoping Senku didn’t notice how flattered he was. “As much as I’d like the smooth and easy option of sailing a boat, approaching from the sea will be too easily noticed and I’m just not sure we can make a sailboat large enough with our current knowhow. I don’t know anything about oatsbay except third-hand through guests on the show, but I’ve heard the bigger ones can be brutal to build without someone with a lot of experience making large boats. You can’t just scale them up, especially for wooden boats. The stresses fuck the whatsadoodles sideways so you need specialized thingamajigs. We’d have to find the Nanami Maritime Academy on Shikoku and revive someone from there, unless we want to travel further or gamble on finding someone from a shipyard with ship building knowledge.” Gen blazed ahead despite Senku’s giggling, not giving the younger man a chance to comment on how Gen handled not knowing the technical terminology.
“As for the terrain, I’m not great at drawing to scale without measurements to work from and precise drafting tools, I use too much artistic license and turning 3D things into 2D shapes on paper trips me up freehand, but I do have a very accurate mental map of the entire area. The river delta connecting to the sea, because of how the area has eroded into a plateau, is easy to monitor. On the ground, running along the maze of waterways is both difficult and disorienting, but the ability to lose a pursuer in that area is counteracted if they have someone posted by the waterfall giving any kind of signal to direct the hunters,” Gen finished.
“I didn’t go very far in any direction until we had to run for our lives, but I know what you mean. I avoided that area, seemed more likely I’d be the easy meal than the other way around, and put my traps along game trails leading down the plateau toward the water instead. The extensive concrete foundations and underground structures built in that area really effected the local geography over the centuries,” Senku said, looking into the fire and stimming by tapping his fingers on his leg.
“So overland it is, but it will be steep and very hilly. I know an easy path and a few faster ones, but we’re comparing ‘be part mountain goat’ to ‘this is going to suck’ levels of rough terrain for a steady march. The engine will need some kick to make it,” Gen said. “You tell me if it would be better to get it wrong making a wimpy one to test how well the rest of the vehicle holds up and then melt it down to make a better one or to just send it and see how big the crash is.”
“Well, steam power of the kind I’m thinking of shouldn’t explode,” Senku began to say.
“The word ‘shouldn’t’ is carrying a big load in that sentence,” Gen interjected.
“Pressure differentials always create a risk of spontaneous disassembly, and enough heat can cause thermal reconfiguration.” Senku shrugged. Gen gave him an unimpressed look, quite familiar with the engineering euphemisms for ‘it became pieces’ and ‘something vital melted.’ “Risks like that can be mitigated if you pay attention to them. It’s tech from the nineteenth century, but I wouldn’t want to try for internal combustion until I have the time to work out tighter tolerances and figure out better gaskets. Even if we could find that much liquid fuel, and this time of year we can’t, my first attempt at the kind of car engine we had in 2019 would be much more likely to blow apart.” Gen nodded and Senku continued.
“Steam power is the only viable option I see for any vehicle made this winter. I have some experience with RC models at 1/10 and 1/5 scale, but that was all rocket propelled or internal combustion.” Senku mimed the size of the things he’d built. “Some cars, a lot of rockets, and zero boats, so I’m not all that upset that going by sea isn’t a good idea for tactical reasons. I have made sterling engines, but more as tabletop setups powering pumps or dioramas and stuff like that. It might be best to scale what I know up first, then try to improve the power output for the terrain.”
“Then, that’s what we’ll do,” Gen said. “Make it, make it better, and when it is good enough we’ll be ready for the next phase. While you get the finer points of finishing the thing started with Kaseki, I’ll be guiding whoever to go plant the radio.” Senku took a deep breath. “It’ll be fine, I know how to draw attention, but I also know how to go incognito. Take off the lavender coat and my original outfit is all earth tones for a reason. You’ll be chatting with Taiju and Yuzuriha long before the spring thaw.” Senku took another deep breath. Gen frowned, concerned, and then Senku was moving.
A firm, square hand gripped Gen’s shoulder. Senku rose up onto one knee for a moment, his other foot taking most of his weight. He moved across and down using Gen’s shoulder to keep his balance. Fire-warmed cloth brushed past Gen’s face. When it all came to a stop, Senku was raised up on his knees straddling one of Gen’s splayed legs. Gen didn’t speak, didn’t dare breathe as Senku looked down at him.
“Comfort and support; that’s the deal, right?” Senku asked, and it was Gen’s turn to take a deep breath.
“I’ve admired you for a long time, Senku dear, precisely because your mind moves faster and in directions mine can’t,” Gen said, because admitting he was confused in plain language would probably scare Senku off whatever this was too fast for Gen to figure it out.
“You stayed, when I needed you to stay,” Senku said. “You stop when I need you to stop. You read me the riot act when I’m out of line, even the first day we met when I assumed too much. You don’t follow me out of obedience or obligation, but just because we want the same things. You’re a catalyst, the inspiration that gets things going faster or encourages me to do better, and you seem to like it when I take what you offer me and turn it into cascading reactions.”
“I support you,” Gen agreed hesitantly, the manic look on Senku’s face was a little concerning, “but there are some things I won’t do. To be blunt, I don’t think you are capable of asking me for things that would destroy my respect for you entirely, but I had to know. I had to test it. I’ve been wrong about people before, and personal bias is hard to measure from the inside. I needed to know you were the person I thought you were.”
“I know. I like that, too, maybe more than the rest. You pushed me, to make sure we both had a line, to make sure we agree on what would cross it. I can trust that, it’s real. Hypothesis, experimentation, and results, all easily quantified. None of that fairy tale do-anything-for-you bullshit that won’t survive contact with real problems. I even messed it up enough to upset you, or I thought I had, but you let me fix it. You’d take me apart the one way I’d never recover from if you thought I deserved it enough, but you forgave me for being excited over the technology even though it was inappropriate and weird given the context of the conversation,” Senku said, all matter of fact. His other hand came up to grab on Gen’s other shoulder, leaning more on him and filling Gen’s entire field of view. “I like this, living together. Supporting and comforting each other, but I’m going to screw it up, just like I screwed that up. I have no experience, no internet to look things up, nobody I can ask for advice who would have even the vaguest idea how a queer twenty-first century person would expect me to act in a relationship like this, and that means trial and error. We can’t afford errors, not now. Not with…”
“Then wait,” Gen said, desperate to gain some stable footing in the conversation. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“You’re sure?” Senku asked. Lit by the fire, Senku looked both insecure and utterly gorgeous. Gen only had so much self control. If he kept going Gen was going to start touching.
“If you aren’t ready, wait,” Gen said, as calmly as he could manage.
“It isn’t about being ready, it’s just…”
“Just that you want to wait until Tsukasa and Hyoga are dealt with, or until things are more stable. That’s rational. That’s fine. We don’t have to walk around holding hands, or take a day off work to prepare a fancy date once a week. With supply and demand governing market forces, that one bottle of cola was more valuable than a trip to a five star restaurant back in the 2010’s,” Gen babbled nervously. “I’ll still be here, after.”
“You promise, you won’t let yourself be killed even if Hyoga catches you out?” That wasn’t how Gen thought he’d take an assurance that Gen wouldn’t leave, but Gen’s mortality breaking his promises for him was a legitimate concern. “You’ll weasel out of it on a technicality, make them think you are on their side, and come home anyway?” He was so handsome with that concerned furrow between his eyebrows, the firelight bringing his sharp features into higher contrast, his red eyes catching the color of the reflected light to shine in his mostly shadowed face. The domineering position contrasted with his worry and insecurity. Gen felt like he was melting from the inside.
“I’m an awful cockroach of a man. If you’re worried I won’t serve my own self interest in a pinch, don’t be. At worst you’ll find me crawling out of the wreckage as the dust settles, having a mental breakdown and in desperate need of a cuddle because I had to use my yo-yo to blow out someone’s kneecap or trip someone off a cliff in self defense,” Gen said. “You asked me to stay here with you, and you’d have to do something dire to be rid of my respect, but I’ll leave when you ask me to go. I’m here until you ask me to go.”
“I don’t want Tsukasa to dictate if I’m ready for this or not,” Senku said, a rumble of anger under the words that Gen didn’t expect.
“What do you want? Now, tonight. What are you doing right now?” Gen asked, trying to cut this down to a smaller question.
“I want to bite you.” Gen raised and eyebrow at the odd declaration.
“That’s… bold. Kinky first move for an unkissed virgin,” Gen said, a bit glad of a chance to break the intensity with some levity.
“No, I wanted… I meant… I want to leave a mark on you.”
“Feeling possessive?” Gen asked, tilting his head cutely.
“Yeah,” Senku said shamelessly, still staring down at Gen. A mind like that giving Gen his full undivided attention was such a heady experience, and looming over Gen like this made it so much more. “It isn’t just about the war, about making a mistake and hurting you when we need to be focused. Legally, because of the village laws, we can’t officially be anything in public until next October, so I can’t… I want to make a mark, even if only the two of us will know about it, because we can’t be anything until I’ve been divorced for a year.” Right, that explained some things. “I don’t like asking that of you, when I already hurt you so much by accident that day. You didn’t deserve it then, and it would be even worse of me now to treat a partner like an afterthought or something kept in storage gathering dust for months while I handle more urgent things.” That explained the rest of it. Hell, that explained Senku’s attitude in Gen’s first life: a lover deserved to be the top priority of their partner. What a lovely ideal, but Gen was going to unpack that like a child ripping through birthday presents to prove Senku was using an equation without half the necessary variables plugged in. Later, though, tonight he was going to get Senku’s first kiss come hell or high water.
“You should start by kissing me, if you want me to let you leave a hickey on my neck,” Gen said. Senku smiled gently down at Gen. “The law is only for formalized partnerships. So long as Ruri waits another month or so and doesn’t mind being obviously pregnant before her wedding day, which she’s said to my face that she doesn’t, that’s legal too, if a bit frowned upon. I’m an excellent rules lawyer, you should have asked me about the loopholes earlier if that was a major concern. I went through the letter of the laws with Jasper while my arm was healing. We can experiment all we want so long as we don’t get married, and frankly getting married after knowing you less than a year is a touch too fast for me anyway.”
“I like experiments,” Senku said, the smile still growing, becoming something less gentle and more gremlin as he absorbed the options that opened up for him.
“Senku dear, my hard working honeybee, what is it you’d like to test first? I’m quite willing to be your test subject,” Gen said playfully. Senku’s jaw dropped, his breath hitching before speeding up.
“Yes,” Senku declared with authority. Gen hummed quizzically to prompt him to go on. “The pet name, that’s a successful experiment.”
“My honeybee?”
“Yes!” Senku shouted eagerly, his hands flexing on Gen’s shoulders. Oh, he really liked it. “Hardworking, productive, makes things you need and want, something you went through a lot of trouble to get your hands on. My turn,” Senku said as rapidly as a caffeinated auctioneer before he dove forward.
Gen expected hesitance, after all that verbal dancing around, but Senku met Gen’s lips without restraint. It was too rough, their teeth clashed and their lips were in all the wrong positions at first, but Senku was a quick study. Gen’s hands were as good as restrained, flat against the floor to anchor his arms and support their weight as Senku leaned into him from above. Gen tipped his head just so and Senku adjusted the pressure and all sorts of encouraging noises filled the room. If Gen made most of them that was only fair since he couldn’t use his arms to coax Senku along. Senku’s hands pulled at Gen’s clothes, pushing down the haori and blindly - but with accuracy that made it very clear how well Senku could visualize spacial relationships - undoing the laces that held Gen’s undershirt together.
“Senku, my arms,” Gen moaned when his lips were abandoned in favor of mouthing down toward his neck. One of Senku’s fast moving hands reached behind them, the other threaded through Gen’s hair to cup the back of his head.
“Grab me,” Senku said into the crook of Gen’s neck. “I have you.”
Gen reached up to hug Senku, first with one arm and then, when they didn’t crash to the floor, the other. Senku laid them down gently so Gen didn’t bang his head, the display of care making Gen shiver. They pet and kissed each other, taking their time learning how their bodies reacted to each other. The promised hickey at the base of his throat made Gen squirm, but he didn’t mind it so much. Not with the look it put on Senku’s face as he examined his handiwork, and who was going to scold Gen for restricting his costume options in this century? Senku stayed on his knees, hips hovering just far enough away to matter for their first round of kissing. After he looked down at Gen with those sharp analytical eyes drinking in the details of dilated pupils, panting breath, and how Gen’s leather pants fit tight over his hips, Senku sat back onto his heels leaving Gen a little confused.
“Was that good?” Senku asked, his gaze dropping down and off to the side shyly.
“It was wonderful. I’m surprised you have to ask,” Gen said, his voice low and husky.
“Well,” Senku pointed down at Gen’s lap.
“Is that a problem for you?” Gen wasn’t sure how he managed to keep his voice even with how worried he was that his reaction hadn’t been enough. He was excited, if not fully there, but the tent Senku had in his lap made what Gen had going look pathetic.
“I was kinda wondering the same thing,” Senku said.
“I feel good, but we don’t have to keep going if you don’t want to,” Gen said, petting Senku’s thigh.
“You don’t mind that I’m, you know, when you aren’t?” Senku pointed at the tent in his lap, which had shrunk a bit.
“I was,” Gen said. Unfortunately, the past tense was accurate.
“Oh.” Senku put his hand on Gen’s. “Maybe you could show me how to do it better?” Gen sat up and reached for Senku.
“Just kiss me,” Gen said confidently. “Don’t worry so much about the rest.” Senku did, but chastely. Gentler pecks and a less confident grip. Gen melted into it, taking some initiative, but it was clear Senku was still embarrassed and unsure. Gen hugged Senku tightly for a moment and whispered in his ear. “Sometimes people lose the mood, it’s fine.”
“Yeah, I guess I ruined it,” Senku mumbled.
“Not ruined. You suspected your experiment was going wrong and you checked I was alright,” Gen said, settling his arms around Senku, who was essentially sitting in his lap now. “Ongoing consent is a good thing, but if I wasn’t enjoying myself I’d have spoken up. There was nothing you were doing to prevent me from speaking.”
“You did say something when your arms were uncomfortable,” Senku pointed out.
“See? Still, you thought something was wrong and asked. Nothing wrong with that. You were being very sexy until you lost your nerve.”
“You don’t have to…” This kind of insecurity wasn’t a good look on Senku.
“I know I don’t. I’m saying it was good for me because it was good for me. Stop looking for fault and take the win. That was the hottest come-on I’ve ever experienced. Consider me seduced,” Gen insisted.
“Alright. What now?” Senku asked. Gen looked at his pinched eyebrows and the flat line of his mouth. He really was confused, it was almost like… Of course, he only knew what to do with total rejection as he had likely read or seen in some trashy drama or the opposite situation as demonstrated in a porno. Partial success was clearly baffling uncharted territory for Senku.
“Silly honeybee,” Gen teased him, rocking side to side to render Senku physically off-balance as well, “we go to bed.”
“But…” Senku struggled to stay on Gen as they rocked.
“To sleep, because it is late,” Gen clarified.
“Oh.” Gen released his hold on Senku and got up to get into bed. The sudden release dumped the scientist unceremoniously onto the floor. “Ow. If I didn’t do anything wrong then what was that for?”
“Implying, however indirectly, that my erection was too small to keep your interest.”
“Shit,” Senku drew out the word into a long mournful moan of regret.