Chapter Text
"How much did you spend today?" is the first sentence Sori utters once he enters the check-up room.
Sori stands menacingly in the doorway. One hand holding a writing pad with a health assessment paper clipped to it, another hand still gripping the door knob. Eyes locking on Supra’s figure.
The guy’s face is unreadable. The lack of his usual grin and mischievous spark in his eyes, plus the extra sigh after finishing his words are weirding Supra out.
But the fact that Sori is currently wearing a visor clears everything. Because there can be only one logical reason why: Sori had just left the lab before coming here, he didn’t get the chance to put it off. Judging from his battered lab coat and the prominent eye bags under the medic’s eyes, Supra is positive that his partner has been stuck in the lab for at least 12 hours. 2 days at most, if his superior is a rule abiding researcher. 3 days or more if his superior is a ‘rules are made to be broken’ researcher.
‘Senior went all in on him huh… poor guy…’ Supra says to himself.
Feeling that he waited long enough for Supra to at least say something, Sori spoke, “Did you hit your head or something?” Sori walks closer to Supra to immediately check his head.
Sori’s actions managed to surprise Supra. Jolting him awake from his thoughts.
“I didn’t spend much,” Supra answers sheepishly as he gives Sori a look. “Was just a bunch of leaderless small critters. I could’ve taken care of them on my own. Frostfire handled most of them out of worry, as usual.”
“Feel any pain?”
“No.”
“Did you by chance come into contact with Gentar or Sopan the past few days?”
“Can’t remember.”
Sori scribbles something on his paper.
Supra himself is sitting on a chair all alone in the check-up room. Well, at least before his designated medical practitioner came.
He wasn’t alone, um, around half an hour—or was it an hour—ago. There was Frostfire with him. They were paired up to clean the horde of monsters together earlier this morning, but since Glacier had apparently been waiting for his partner beforehand, the two were able to quickly finish up whatever they needed to do and left Supra on his own.
“Welcome back,” Glacier greeted. Spinning lazily on one of the many wheeled-chairs in the room, his writing pad discarded somewhere on the table near the window.
Glacier’s sudden appearance made Supra and Frostfire halt in the doorway. Interrupting their previous conversation—or just Frostfire’s monologue—regarding the storm clouds that have been occupying the sky for some days. Glacier is well known for being late in conducting check-ups due to the amount of work he has on his plate.
“Glace!” Frostfire exclaimed as he lurched toward Glacier’s seat. If Frostfire had a tail, Supra bet it would be wagging like crazy right now.
Glacier, seemingly unfazed with Frostfire’s hyperactive antics, opened his arms for a hug. Frostfire, ever so open for hugs, dove right to Glacier’s lap, latching onto his partner like a newborn koala sticking to its mother.
Supra shivered at that.
Here’s the thing. Frostfire’s body temperature is simply ridiculous. That includes his tolerance toward extreme temperatures too. Highly possible that it’s some kind of side effect from his powers.
In conclusion, Frostfire is not your best buddy to hug. One second he’s as hot as Supra’s old computer’s engine while used, the next second he’s as cold as a corpse. So yeah, he’s not really comfortable to hug. Glacier would beg to differ, though.
As Frostfire continued clinging and babbling nonsense to Glacier, the latter had somehow picked up his writing pad and started doing what he should be doing. Glacier moved his pen with such ease it looks like he’s just scribbling bullshit on the paper. It is, in fact, not bullshit, though.
The longer Supra watched the scene in front of him, the more he felt like he’s watching something he shouldn’t be watching. Goodness gracious, Supra really wished to ban PDA in working hours. Being a third wheel is way worse than having to fend off a horde of monsters himself. So he turned his back towards them and pretended to observe the door like there’s something interesting about it. Yep, the nearly invisible scratches on the door is definitely more interesting than whatever Frostfire and Glacier have going on.
“Alright,” Glacier finally spoke after a while. Supra took it as a cue that it’s safe for him to turn his back.
When he came face to face with the two, Frostfire had already detached himself from Glacier’s body. Both of them are standing. Glacier stretching himself with a muffled groan, Frostfire jumping around like he’s ready to break the ceilings with the combined force of his legs powers and frontal lobe hardness.
“Come on, Frost. Let’s grab lunch.”
“Let’s go!” Frostfire said, accompanied by yet another jump. “What ya feel like getting, Glacy?”
“Hmm. Shrimp fried rice.” Glacier answered shortly, making his way toward the door.
“Sounds good! I’ll get that too. Plus a scoop of chocolate ice cream. Scratch that, Imma get two!”
When Glacier passed him, he patted Supra’s shoulder, “I’ll call Sori for you. Don’t be so tense, go take a seat.”
Supra gladly obliged. He took the chair that Glacier used earlier and waited patiently for Sori to come as he pondered on what he just witnessed.
Yeah, that’s about what happened.
Without Supra realizing, Sori had pulled himself another chair and sat right in front of him.
He looks straight into Supra's eyes. His looks filled with questions, his eyebrows quirking in confusion before firing his question, “You really REALLY didn’t hit your head on anything, right? You’re acting kinda weird. You’re looking at me weird.”
For the nth time that day Supra lagged behind. Wasting a few seconds of silence looking at nothingness before forming a response, “No, I didn’t. You can ask Frostfire to make sure. I just had… something occupying my mind. Mhm.”
“Suuure,” Sori says. He doesn’t sound convinced at all.
Some minutes passed. Sori finished asking all the questions he needed to ask Supra and took note of anything noteworthy—Supra doubts there’s any.
“That’s all!” Sori finishes up by drawing his signature sunflower on the paper. “So, what’s been occupying your mind, Mr.Smartypants?” he asks. Tone gradually coming back to the usual cheery one.
Supra doesn’t fancy the nickname much, but he’ll let that slide this time. He got a more pressing matter to attend to, after all. The said event is asking Sori about one very important thing that has plagued him since earlier.
“Do you think Frostfire and Glacier have something going on between them?” Supra genuinely asks.
Sori only looks at him funny then bursts into laughter as a response. Very polite of him, truly. He doesn’t even try to hide his laugh, instead he laughs harder and harder to the point he runs out of breath.
“Oh, God,” Sori says between pants, trying to even out his breathing. Supra is about to say something when Sori lifts his hand. Signing a ‘shush’ to him. “Good God… Glacier did tell me that you can be slow at times. I didn’t think you’d take this long, though.”
“So?”
“Yes. Yes, Supra. Glacier and Frost are dating.”
Supra is shocked, maybe. Well, to be honest, not quite surprised. Or, uh, yeah, yep. Not surprised. Childhood friends and all. Wait, what isn’t he included in the childhood friends thing? Alright, nevermind. The two of them had been together before Supra even knew them. But still, WHAT?!
Supra gapes as he thought.
“You’ll want to close your mouth~ A little fly can come in anytime you know~” Sori puts his index finger in Supra’s mouth, only hovering in the gaping mouth, not touching anything. “Like this one.” He smiles. Naughty glint in his yellow-green eyes.
Supra jolts, hand reflexively slapping away Sori’s hand as he breaks out of his trance.“Wh- why would you do that?” Supra exclaimed in panic. He jerks his head backwards a tad too fast that his body follows suit. Resulting in him falling off not-so-gracefully from the chair and a crispy laugh from yours truly, Sori.
“You’re too fun not to tease. Hehe. Here,” Sori offers his hand as a leverage for Supra. Not that he needs it, but the sentiment is all that matters. Supra accepts Sori’s hand and stands up.
“Since when, though,” Supra asks further, going back to his agenda. “They’ve never told me about it.”
“Here’s the thing, Sup,” Sori grips Supra’s shoulders firmly, looking the man straight in his eyes. “They never told anyone about it.”
“Then how do you know?” Supra tilts his head.
“Supra, dear. If you’d take a moment away from your reports and journal reading and start paying attention to the world around you, I’m sure you’ll be able to find wonderful things.
Like figuring out that Glacier and Frost have been dating for the past six months or so. Before you ask anything, yes, they’ve only been official six months ago. But if anyone told me that they’re dating, or even married, two years ago. I’d believe it.” Sori explains. Lengthily.
Supra is quite sure Sori said another sentence or two near the end of his speech but he said it in such a hurry and in an extremely low volume that Supra couldn't catch what the medic was saying.
“Well, sorry for finding journals more interesting than my friends’ love life. Unlike a certain someone, I’m not nosy,” Supra says, accompanied with a scoff.
“Hmm~ It doesn’t sound like that five minutes ago~” Sori teases.
“T-that was an important thing for my own journal on human psych and behavior!” Supra tries to reason.
Sori puts up a questioning look. Hand under his chin as he lifts his right eyebrows, “Really? Isn’t that Lil’ Sopan’s subject?”
“It’s not like two people can’t make a journal on the same subjects, right?” Supra retorts.
“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Sori shrugs.
Supra scoffs.
“Anyways~ Strip.”
The abrupt tone shift and the suddenness of Sori’s order earns him a “huh” from Supra.
“Excuse me, what?” Supra makes sure. Just in case his ears are getting worse and he misheard what Sori had said.
“Strip, Supra. Now.”
As much as Supra wants to retort or fight or decline with a quick ‘no thank you’ and escape from the crime scene. He doesn't think Sori will let him go this time.
After deliberately thinking, Supra decided to resign his fate to God’s hands. He decided to comply.
Not without a sigh, Supra stands up to take off his clothes. The cap comes off first, seeing a half naked dude with a cap will be, uh, odd. Then he starts peeling off the clothes covering his body. The outer vest comes off first, Supra throws it to the chair he sat on. Next the shirt, and lastly the innershirt.
(“What’s with the layers? Don’t you feel hot under those many?” Glacier chided
“Says the man who wears long sleeves and cape everyday,” Supra argues. Effectively shutting Glacier down.)
“See, there’s nothing wrong,” Supra tries to convince Sori. To be fair, he didn’t feel any pain throughout the day. That’s what makes him so sure about not being hurt.
On the other hand, Sori still looks very skeptical. “Turn around,” Sori orders once more.
Supra exhales but does what Sori told him to anyway.
The medic doesn’t say anything and keeps staring at his back, leaving Supra utterly confused.
“Is something wrong with my back?” Supra asks, head turning back to look at Sori’s expression.
“Nope. Just a slight bruise on your left shoulder,” Sori calmly says.
“Ah, that was probably Frostfire hitting me a bit too hard,” Supra guesses. “You know how often he loses control while excited, right? He did ‘pat’ my back on our way here…” Supra shrugs.
Sori sighs in defeat. He slides away to a shelf, opening it and pulls out a heat pack. As he slides back to Supra’s seat, Sori rips open the packaging and slaps the pack to Supra’s back.
“Ouch,” Supra yelps. “Now that hurts,” he rubs the heat pack.
“Good. Means that you can still actually feel pain,” Sori sneers.
“Besides, why don't you just use your healing?”
“No way I’m spending my precious energy and highly demanded healing ability on something trivial like that.”
“Bullshit. It wouldn’t even take you a minute to heal that simple bruise,” Supra puts on his black inner shirt back.
“But I don't wanna,” Sori stands up, taking Supra’s excess clothings and throws it to the man. Supra, not prepared for the sudden attack, fumbled a bit, yet still managed to catch his clothes.
Supra sighs, “Why are you my partner again?”
“Because I’m the best healer around and you're a terminally stupid fighter who loves to jump into dangers and get himself hurt. Easy,” Sori sing-songs.
“Yeah, yeah,” Supra gives up. He wouldn’t win in a silly argument against Sori. “Let’s get out of here. It’s getting suffocating,” Supra walks towards the door.
“Wait up!” Sori follows him. “Where are you going?”
“Dunno. Back to my room. Read a book or write or help Glacier with his reports. His reports are getting out of hand. One of these days we’re gonna start sleeping on top of the papers.”
“Hahahah! Good luck, Glacy’s roommate~”
“Hahh… Who arranged the rooms again?”
“Someone from the main branch. Can’t recall their name, it's kinda hard to pronounce.”
“Why won’t they room me with you if you’re my partner? Glacier can go with Frostfire and I believe the both of them would be more than happy.”
“Not sure either,” Sori shrugs. “I wouldn’t want Frost and Glace rooming together, though.”
“Hm?” Supra tilts his head in confusion as he looks at Sori.
Sori halts. He looks back at Supra, blinks twice in utter disbelief, “Aishhh! Figure that out on your own! You don’t need to learn more about Astrophysics, Metallurgy, and whatnot. You need to learn more about humans and society as a whole!”
“Okay…?” Supra reluctantly speaks.
“You know what? Bye, I’m gonna grab a snack and visit my babies!” Sori says as he leaves Supra. Heading to the Cafeteria.
“Uh, yeah,” Supra isn’t sure what to say in this situation. “Enjoy your meal!” he adds.
Sori doesn't reply verbally. He only waves his hands without looking back.
As Sori’s figure gets further and further, Supra continues his walk back to his room. Still in utter confusion. He’s thinking of reading more journals on the topic Sori recommended to him.