You Will Not Be Alone Tonight

Chapter 1 - The Corners Between Conscience and Faith

"What's that?"

Watari smiled as he carefully skirted the complicated network of test tubes, beakers, and glass pipelines arranged on his lab's central table. "It's my pet project."

Tsuzuki, who had been examining the flask until then, set it down as quickly as he could without risking its breakage. "Another sex-change potion?"

"So much time and energy wasted on such an impractical pursuit," Hisoka said from the corner nearest the closed door before turning another page of the book he was reading.

Watari put his hands on his hips and frowned. "The sex-change potion is far from a 'pet project'." He waited until at least Tsuzuki expressed the appropriate degree of contrition before continuing. "No. This is a potion that can enhance a Shinigami's spirit form with the ability to enter the dreams of others."

"Wow. Does it really work?" Tsuzuki crouched so that his eyes were level with the violet liquid in the flask he had been all too eager to get rid of only five seconds previously.

"Certainly not as advertised," said Hisoka, ever the sceptic.

"I haven't tested it yet." Watari let Hisoka's comment pass with a glare. "In fact, I was hoping that you would help me with that. What do you say?"

"I don't know, Watari." Tsuzuki's voice carried the apprehension with which a trained rat moves to meet the source of his previous punishments. "We've had some bad experiences with your inventions: remember that time we got turned into kids?"

"Don't forget the body-switching chocolates." Hisoka snapped his book shut. "Your past mistakes are the least of the reasons why this potion should never be tested, Watari. Invading people's dreams goes far beyond invasion of privacy: it's completely immoral, not to mention unfair and dangerous to the victim."

"Hisoka's right, Watari." Tsuzuki rested his chin on the table in front of him and rolled his eyes up to regard the scientist. "If we needed to do it for a case, I guess it might be useful, but we can't just use any random person as a test subject. We'd have to have a very good reason for doing something so drastic, or Tatsumi would kill us."

Watari's eyes flashed. "Funny you should mention Tatsumi."

Tsuzuki cocked his head in confusion. "Why?"

"I was thinking that he could be our test subject." Watari held up his hands to forestall the objections that would surely follow such a controversial idea. "Hear me out. It's obvious to everyone here that Tatsumi has things to work through, but he's too self-reliant to actually ask for the help he needs. In his dreams, though, where he's totally defenceless, we might be able to help him. At the very least, we might learn just what he's got to deal with, and understand him better."

"It's none of our business," Hisoka said. "I'll have no part of this, and if you insist on going through with it, I will warn Tatsumi. The reasons for his pain are his to withhold or share, as he wishes." He looked at his partner. "Tsuzuki?" The unspoken request, "Back me up," hung between them.

But Tsuzuki said nothing, at least not until a few moments had passed in silence. "Do you think... it might actually help him?" His tone carried a desperate hopefulness, one that could lead its bearer into the courting of any danger for its promised outcome.

"Well, there are no guarantees, of course. but..." Watari trailed off deliberately, but his usual grin was conspicuously absent.

"Tsuzuki, you can't possibly be thinking about this. It's total... mind-rape." Hisoka's voice quivered slightly on the last word. "We can't--"

Tsuzuki looked up at his partner. "I want to help him, Hisoka. I want him to be happy again." There was a seriousness about his entire being that was remarkable because of its simple rarity, and though Hisoka opened his mouth to speak at least four more times, no further objections came from him.

Finally, he said, "I still think it's a bad idea."

"Does that mean you're going to help us anyway?" Tsuzuki grinned cautiously.

"I haven't decided." When Tsuzuki's grin began to waver, Hisoka amended, "I won't stop you, though." This earned him a tackling hug from Tsuzuki, and Watari cringed as Tsuzuki's momentum nearly sent the pair flying right into a carefully arranged set of particularly volatile chemicals.

"Let's plan this outside, then," he said, walking to the door and opening it for Tsuzuki and Hisoka. "It's nearly lunch break anyway, and it's less likely we'll be overheard there."

Hisoka nodded, extricated himself from Tsuzuki's embrace with the ease of long practice, and exited the lab. Tsuzuki followed, his grin turning slightly anxious. "I hope we're doing the right thing," he said.

Watari smiled, closing the laboratory door behind them. "I would have thought you'd have lived long enough to know that there's no such thing."

 

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Amid Purgatory's perpetual rain of cherry blossoms, Hisoka asked Watari, "How were you planning to go about this?"

"Well, for starters, we can't all go in at the same time, or even on the same night. We have to minimize the strain on Tatsumi's mind." Watari's eyes flicked back and forth between them, as though he were scared of losing his audience's attention. "Also, the potion's effects aren't permanent, and since I haven't begun to examine the potential side effects of more than one dosage, we only get one shot each."

"And what are we supposed to do once we get there?" Now that he had nearly committed to Watari's gambit, Hisoka had begun to dissect its flaws. "What if we don't get an opportunity to do anything, or find out anything?"

"Yeah," Tsuzuki said, inhaling half of the pastry he had taken from the box on his desk on the way out of the office in the five second pause before the first word of his next sentence. "What if, when we get there, he's dreaming about pink bunnies hopping around, or counting stacks of money, or reading restaurant invoices?"

"Or something else completely unrelated to any issues he might have." Hisoka looked from Tsuzuki to Watari. "We'd be wasting our time, and violating him to no purpose."

"To be honest, I'm not sure how we're going to do this." Watari toyed with the end of one of his thicker locks of hair. "My best guess, however, is that our presence will upset the thread of whatever dream he's already engaged in: perhaps we'll even be able to control how and where it diverges, as though it were our own lucid dream."

"But we can't know for sure, is what you're saying," Tsuzuki said.

"Not until we've experimented a bit. Which is why I'm going to be the first one to go, tonight." Watari sat down on one of the stone benches underneath the cherry trees, and a stray blossom fell onto his shoulder. "You guys are going to need all the information I can give you. After all, you'd have to do most of the actual helping, anyway." There was no bitterness or resentment in Watari's voice; his casualty seemed synonymous with contentment.

"I don't think you--" Tsuzuki began, his tone pitched for reassurance, but Watari stopped him with an upheld hand.

"I don't mind. It's the result I care about, not who gets it." He smiled and rose to his feet. "I'll let you know what I find out. Maybe I'll do such a good job that you two won't even be needed."

Hisoka sighed. "Just be careful. Putting Tatsumi's demons to rest isn't going to do much good if you turn him into a vegetable in the process."

"You know, maybe we should just forget Tatsumi and try to work through your trust issues instead. What do you think, kid?" Hisoka's eyes narrowed, and Tsuzuki frowned even as he edged protectively closer to his partner. "Hmph. No one ever appreciates my sense of humour." With an abbreviated wave, he turned and began to walk back toward his lab.

"I'm not sleeping tonight," Hisoka said, and his seriousness made Tsuzuki chuckle despite his guardian\s instinct.
 

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