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"You’re right," Asougi admits grudgingly, "my head still does hurt a bit."
Ryuunosuke raises a hand and rubs the back of his own head in sympathy, as Susato-san reaches across him and snatches the book from their friend's grasp. It snaps shut with the sort of resounding thump that only a law book could produce, usually a direct correlate to its age and dustiness. "You see, Kazuma-sama? This is why the doctor said you had to rest!"
"I am resting," protests Asougi, gesturing vaguely around the ship's cabin and at the bed he was sitting in, its thick layers of blankets pulled up to his chest. "I haven’t really moved from here all day, have I? I sent Hosonaga to the infirmary to get the doctor instead of going back there myself; you've been going to my desk to bring me everything I need...Even Naruhodou helped make trips to the kitchen at least five times!"
Ryuunosuke folds his arms. "What's that supposed to mean, 'even Naruhodou' ?! And that’s...biasing things, to make them sound more restful than they actually were!"
"I was trying to thank you for your help, and there's never anything wrong with stating the facts – "
"Then maybe," Ryuunosuke says, "you should include the fact the doctor only stayed two minutes when he came...and everything he told us we were either already doing, or didn't really make a lot of sense. And then that argument he got into with Holmes-san in the hall was really loud, and lasted a long time. And each time you sent us to your desk, you refused to let us look through the stuff there. So actually you've been getting up a lot, to get everything yourself."
"And maybe," – Susato-san looks at Ryuunosuke sadly, folding her fingers together in front of her – "Naruhoudou-sama is trying to have us forget that, the last time he went to the kitchen, he himself ate most of what he brought back."
Ryuunosuke slumps in guilt, even though he's pretty sure Susato-san isn't really upset with him – his unfortunate encounter with the Susato throw earlier that day had, after all, taught him exactly what to expect from his friend's legal assistant when she was angry. He tries to grin in what he hopes to be a sheepish, disarming kind of way. "Umm...sorry? I was just really excited to try the cheese?"
He isn't sure if it had the effect he was reaching for, because Susato-san's woeful expression remains unchanged.
"Naruhodou, you..." Asougi, who had for a moment seemed content to listen to the two of them debate his inability to rest, looks at him now, quiet and appraising...and was that worry Ryuunosuke saw there as well? "You've been through a lot today, haven't you?"
"Huh?" Ryuunosuke sits up, surprised. The rickety wooden chair he had dragged over to the bed creaks further in protest. "Should you really be asking me that?"
After all, he isn't the one who is currently bedridden, with the back of his head covered by a still-spreading bruise and a still-sizeable lump. (Hematoma, the ship's doctor had said, barely comprehensible behind his broken English and heavy Russian accent.)
Granted, though, he had been woken up in the middle of the night by a sickening thump, which he now knew to be the sound of his friend striking his head against the bedboard. Had produced a much louder thump himself when he forced open the closet door and tumbled out half-asleep, trying to see what was going on. That had in turn led to a piercing scream – from a frightened-looking girl in Russian clothing, standing there, frozen, at the foot of the bed – and suddenly the lamps were on and all kinds of people were pouring into the room. And then, in the long, chaotic, terrifying minutes before Asougi regained consciousness, he was being accused of everything from attempted murder to assault to burglary to being a fugitive revolutionary to –
You've just returned from Afghanistan, haven't you?!
It took some time, but before being rushed away by the doctor Asougi had recovered enough coherence to explain, and everyone finally understood that the only crime Ryuunosuke was guilty of was being a stowaway. They'd kept him there for ages, though, throwing one question after another at him, and there'd been talk at the end of putting him in handcuffs and locking him in the hold.
(Lock me in the infirmary instead, he remembers thinking in numb acceptance. At least then I'll know if Asougi’s alright.)
At that point, one person in particular had set off an even longer debate, and Ryuunosuke found himself released instead to the custody of a self-styled famous detective – who had proclaimed that Ryuunosuke, having been present at the scene, would be indispensable in his search for the lost cat that had sparked the incident in the first place. After hours of being dragged along the length of the ship and correcting his companion’s nonsensical conclusions, they did indeed find the cat. And inadvertently, along with it, the true identity of Asougi's Russian neighbor.
Surprisingly, it was after that that the ship crew's had removed Ryuunosuke’s handcuffs, and returned to treating him as they'd before – namely, pretending he wasn't there.
He'd asked Holmes-san about it, after, in a rare moment of stillness as they were heading back across the ship to Asougi's cabin. It's strange…we know who she is now, and that it was an accident, of course…but there's no real reason it should change what they do with me. They can still ship me back to Japan if they want, can't they?
Holmes-san had looked up, his face level with Ryuunosuke's, from where he'd been leaning over to examine a locked door. Do you realize, Mr Naruhodou, that because you've stumbled upon one of their secrets – and offered to keep it, out of kindness – they think it's only fair to do the same for you?
He had smiled, green eyes piercing, and Ryuunosuke had thought that, just maybe, it was the first logical thing he'd pointed out all day.
Ryuunosuke blinks. Asougi and Susato-san are still looking at him with concern, and he realizes – belatedly – that staring at the wall while getting lost in reflection probably hadn't inspired much confidence.
"It wasn't that bad," he says, wishing his voice would be a little less shaky.
It's not a lie – it really hadn't been that terrible, considering that he's still sitting here in this cabin with them. With all three of them awake, relatively well, and recovering overall.
Asougi only frowns more deeply. “I’m sorry that I spent some of the day...not myself, but you'll have to tell me about everything in detail, sooner or later. And if it seems anyone on this ship has treated you unfairly," – his hand wanders to his left hip, where his sword would've been, had he not been sitting in bed and propped up by at least four pillows – "you can rest assured it won't be overlooked."
"No, no, it's fine!!" Ryuunosuke does not want, after all, to give anyone reason to rethink their decision to let him stay on board. "I was a stowaway, and it looked suspicious! What were they supposed to do?"
"Hear you out in a reasonable manner?"
"Naruhodou-sama was really in trouble, come to think of it," Susato-san adds softly. "It's fortunate that Holmes-sama was there to save you."
"Save me?" That isn't the way Ryuunosuke thinks about it, but it's...sort of true? In the most confusing, nerve-wracking, and indirect way possible.
He shakes his head a little to clear it, and turns back to Asougi. "We're getting off track again! So maybe it's been crazy, and I haven't really slept, but at least I don't have a...a...whatever it was that Russian guy said!"
"A...what?"
Ryuunosuke tries to think hard. In English. Which feels a bit weird, since this is Asougi he's talking to. "That...thing that sounded like...confession?"
"I don't think that was it, Naruhodou-sama."
"…congruent? Commotion! "
"Naruhodou,” says Asougi, fixing him with a half-serious glare, "...are you trying to mock me?"
"Huh? No!"
"A commotion, in English, means something like a very noisy disturbance. Your bad memory is one thing, but as your friend, I'm a bit insulted that you would accuse me of such a thing."
"Huh...I didn’t know that." Ryuunosuke smiles sheepishly. "So, as in, I could say, Earlier this morning, the doctor and Mr Holmes made a commotion in the hallway, and that would be the proper way to use it in a sentence?"
Asougi folds his arms. "I guess you must be feeling alright, if you still have the energy to learn vocabulary."
"Hey, I studied English at university – it's what I'm supposed do!"
Susato-san had produced a book from her kimono sleeve, and now looks up from flipping calmly through its pages. "I actually think the word is concussion."
"That sounds...about right, actually..."
“A concussion,” continues Susato from her book; strange how Ryuunosuke could've sworn that it'd been a law dictionary before, and also not written in English. "A head injury that, because of its impact on the brain, may lead to effects such as loss of consciousness, confusion, headache, nausea, and difficulties with memory."
Ryuunosuke swallows. "That sounds...really serious, when it puts it like that."
"Hnnh," mutters Asougi. "And does that book also say what that doctor did earlier – that I should do nothing but rest, and sleep, and avoid using my mind in general?"
"Yes, it does," says Susato firmly, as she snaps the book neatly shut and returns it to her sleeve. "Which is why we have you, Kazuma-sama, under surveillance."
"Not the best use of your time, when both you and Naruhodou are clearly exhausted and need rest – "
"Which we will get, as soon as Kazuma-sama does the same – "
"I still think everyone is overreacting. After all, after whatever it was they put in the food last night, everyone on the ship has those exact symptoms. And if they've been able to keep the ship running – not to mention deal with whatever it was that Sherlock Holmes got up to – I can certainly continue to do some work – "
"No, you CAN'T," says Ryuunosuke in irritation. Not quite shouting, but louder than he'd meant to.
All of a sudden, though, he is a little annoyed at his friend, who can't seem to stop focusing on things like his and Susato-san's perfectly fine health and his own short-lived arrest, while pointedly ignoring the much larger problem at hand. "If you'd just stop and notice, it's not us that you should be worrying about!"
He takes Asougi's law book, lying forgotten on the bedspread, and shoves it a couple of feet further away for emphasis. "You...you weren't really that awake, were you, to hear what the doctor had to say when he first got here? How close it was, what could've happened..."
His stomach twinges in an echo of the nauseating plunge it'd taken, when he'd first heard those words as he stood in this same room, before a sea of blinding lamps and hostile faces.
"I – This was supposed to be our adventure, and it will still be our adventure, we'll still show London everything you can do, and more...But for all that to happen, we need...we need you to be here."
"Naruhodou – "
"I'd be...a really sad sight in London on my own."
He blinks and looks down, suddenly exhausted. But there, finally, was the fear that they'd all harbored, put into words.
"So, please, put some effort into resting – I know you can be good at it, just like you are with everything else!" – he’s babbling a little, he knows – "We can get you things, sit with you, even read to you if that's what it takes. Just...get better soon!"
For a moment, all there is is the distant drone of the ship's engine, and the two of them staring at him – Asougi in quiet surprise, and Susato-san with wide eyes that makes her look her age for the first time that day.
And then Asougi starts to laugh.
"What now?!"
"It's – it's nothing!" Asougi folds his arms in front of him, expression a little exasperated but also strangely...admiring? Ryuunosuke is reminded suddenly of the way his friend had looked at him the one time he'd ended up falling into someone’s dango stand on the way to the university, because a carriage had cut too fast through the crowded street, and he'd been forced to move quickly to help an old woman out of the way.
"I assure you, Naruhodou - I will, as you said, 'get better soon'."
"Umm...that does make me happy, I guess...but I'm still trying to figure out what was funny!"
"Nothing was funny," says Asougi seriously. "I was only...relieved, and reminded once again - I'm very fortunate to have a friend like you."
"I – thanks?"
"None needed."
A brief silence, where Asougi smiles still, and beside him Susato-san's eyes are shining.
"Now, I heard you say something about reading to me?"
Ryuunosuke nods, feeling as though he's still missing something, but mostly just immensely relieved that Asougi is finally heeding their advice. He drags the difficult-looking law book closer, and a glance at the cover confirms that it's indeed in English, just has he'd suspected. "I'll do my best – I mean, at the very least, I should know most of the words."
Asougi sits up to readjust the pillows behinds him. "Whatever you can do would be very helpful, and make resting go by more quickly. Page 193, I think that's where I was."
Ryuunosuke repositions the heavy book in front of him and flips it open, suddenly glad for this small measure of normalcy. Following the page numbers in the book's minute, cursive script, he finds page 193 and scans the opening lines.
…Such full statements of the case as appear in allegations may indeed in some instances prevent surprise, and, so far, be beneficial; but on the whole, we are of opinion that this mode of pleading leads to unnecessary expense and delay, and moreover is occasionally prejudicial to the ascertainment of truth, by leading the witness to depose in the very terms of the plea…
Belatedly, he realizes that even if he knows all the words, it could be very embarrassing if he fell asleep in the middle of reading.
"Umm...Susato-san? Maybe we could actually take turns? I'll go first, and you can take over after a while?"
Susato-san had for this entire time been sitting straight in her chair, watching their conversation with the same quiet concentration he'd seen her wear before in the courtroom, now literally a world away. "Hmm? Oh, you should start, Naruhodou-sama – you really do have a way with words."
She springs to her feet, and gives a quick bow in their direction. "Take your time, actually – I'll go get you more cheese!"
Despite his best efforts, Ryuunosuke does fall asleep first, hunched over the law book where it rests on the bedspread. Asougi drapes one of the many blankets over his shoulders, before leaning back, and doing the same himself.