#DUDE I'M GONNA BE CACKLING OVER THAT FOR THE NEXT CENTURY TBH 🤣

[howthesleeplesswander]

"Your words, not mine," the doctor trilled with a mischievous glint in golden eyes. Something told him that the next time Kaz requested this particular 'prescription,' a certain Crow may be the unsuspecting recipient. "You're quite welcome. I hope it helps ease what troubles you."

Except there was apparently more troubling the other's mind than just the paralytic's recipient. With the transaction complete, Baizhu expected his visitor to swiftly take his leave...and yet he hesitated. An additional request, perhaps? Interest piqued, Baizhu canted his head, waiting in silent curiosity...until that point-blank question seized him by the throat. Caught off guard, all Baizhu could do was blink as his secrets were neatly summed up without so much as a wasted breath.

He wasn't surprised that Kaz had figured it out. Of course he had. The weaknesses of others were his currency; the foundation upon which he'd built his reputation, his skills. From the very beginning, Baizhu had known it was only a matter of time.

No, what surprised the good doctor was that Kaz was addressing it with him. Why admit that he knew? It had to be obvious after their duration of working together, so why bother getting confirmation? Why was Baizhu's weakness not treated like the others? Not held close to the chest and poised for an opportune strike should the need arise?

For a handful of heartbeats, the doctor was silent. Recovering. Considering. Finally, a long sigh blew past his lips. "It's always straight to business with you, isn't it?" What may have sounded like an insult instead carried a hint of fondness. The chuckle that escaped him now was also genuine, also just for Kaz, yet distinctly darker in its undertone. Denying it was pointless—but that didn't mean Baizhu had to like admitting it, either.

For perhaps the first time since they'd met, he felt himself buckling under that piercing stare. Pivoting away from Kaz and back towards the shelf, he moved the crate of sweet flowers back to its place. "As usual, you've pieced the puzzle together expertly." He stared hard at the wood grain beneath his fingers. Resigned himself.

"No, there is no cure." The confession held no emotion: simply a cold, unyielding fact. "You could say that it's...an extremely rare disease. Or perhaps a medical marvel—depending on your perspective. Historically speaking, only a handful of cases have ever been known, each of which proved fatal for the patient."

There was no trace of the gentle and compassionate doctor in this moment. Instead, he delivered the explanation with the same detached tone one may use when reading from a textbook. Unquestionable. And certainly no reason to let his emotions get the better of him. He'd chosen this for himself, after all.

When he turned back, a smile adorned his lips once again. But it was stiff at the corners; a bit off, like it didn't quite fit his face. "Not to worry; I assure you that neither my condition nor my 'obsession' will interfere with our arrangement. I only regret that it may turn out to be more short-lived of a partnership than either of us intended."

Baizhu’s laugh was always different.  That, or Kaz just paid more attention to it.

When facing the common populace and all their pointless driveling, whining, and never-ending problems needing a kind and generous doctor there at their beck and call to readily provide (Kaz often wondered how he did it), that cordial demeanor of his was as thin as a gossamer drape . . . to anyone who wasn’t an idiot. In other words, very few. It wasn’t that Baizhu held animosity toward his patients, nor was it that he didn’t care. Clearly, truthfully, with the heart of a man who chose to heal more often than hurt (despite having a talent for the latter, given Kaz’s current reason for being here), he found joy in his work. That wasn’t the issue. The issue was that his work still technically counted as customer service.

Which meant all smiles. All pleasantries. All fake chuckles at that one patient who found himself hilarious and had to make the same joke every other time he visited. Those were the chuckles Kaz passively observed from the side, distantly noted their lack of integrity beneath that veil that so easily fooled the rest. And maybe if those were the only laughs one heard, they’d have no reason to think otherwise. Kaz had the advantage of a bigger sample size.

So when he heard the latest fluttering amusement escape the doctor’s lips, he had the passing thought: That one’s genuine. He had an equally passing thought: That one’s for me. But much like that clever little snake’s keen observation being filed away, Kaz too moved on. And yes, in the same way. In the sense of that not being something he’d ignore, but something he’d come back to.

(He couldn’t help it.)

Dutifully, Kaz followed Baizhu farther behind the counter, half-tempted to inquire—challenge, rather—as to what Changsheng could have going on in her life that was so important they returned swiftly, but he did little more than give her a look. And then, the two of them were alone. Kaz was distinctly aware of how seldom this occurred. It shouldn’t have meant anything. It didn’t. But somehow, nonsensically and utterly beyond his control, it also did.

“So, in other words, don’t give it to Jesper,” Kaz noted. “Or do.” Archons knew the sharpshooter could do with sitting still every once in awhile. As he claimed the vial from the doctor’s careful fingers, a thoughtful frown set into his lips. He stowed it away in his pocket, hesitated. Until, somewhat tightly and drifting out along the roof of his mouth in a soft breath, he said, “Thank you.”

And briefly, there was that dilemma again: the dilemma that shouldn’t have been a dilemma but somehow still was. He’d gotten what he came here for, after all, and so had absolutely no reason to stay, but once more . . . his legs were uncooperative (both of them this time instead of the usual one). As if remnants of that earlier slip in his composure remained, Kaz’s fingers twitched rather uncomfortably atop his cane head: stunted and stiff . . . He needed to work with a deck of cards, lockpicks, something to loosen them up again—

“It can’t be cured, can it?” His tongue loosened instead. But Kaz didn’t stop it, much less put any effort into stopping it as he pinned Baizhu beneath an unwavering stare: not to trap the other, but almost as a means of steadying himself. “You’re a doctor. You would’ve figured it out by now. And that’s the reason for your obsession with immortality. You’re desperate.”