I demand a bestie

The light shone on Roxy's skin. Terror filled Ryu's eyes.

"This is the skin of a cutie, Ryuyu." She declared, the body glitter reflected the sunlight. Staring him dead in the eyes.

He was sitting on the ground, trying to back off. A strange green filter covered the room.

"No! No, no...please! Don't glitter bomb my belongings!" He pleads.

"HA...HA…" The glitter sneaked to her nose, threatening a sneeze that would fill the flat with glitter.

"ACHOoOo"

His brother was laughing while braiding his hair. Ryu gave up removing the glitter.

"Why though?"

"I annoyed her." In that context, the word annoying constituted attacking her with sharp tendrils and demanding a fight.

"It's only fair then." He hugged the glitter fountain.

"What are you doing?"

"I got a child patient and my least favorite coworker is on the shift. Two birds with one stone."

"You opportunist."

"Why are you here to begin with?"

"Seeking refugee."

"You know she can glitter bomb your things while you're here..."

"Oh god!" He dashed.

'Did puberty make him dumb?'

"I hope you reflected on your action, comrade." Roxy said while they cleaned themselves with magnetic fiber towels.

"I'm sorry I shouldn't have attacked you."

That somehow made her actually angry.

"What? Did I do something else?"

"You would know if you cared!"

"What?"

"You put my bowls on the bottom shelf instead of the top shelf!"

"I tried to stab you a hundred times and that's what got you mad? Do you know how much soil and plant leaves are spilled on the floor? You don't hear me complaining!"

"It's spilled on my side of the room anyway!"

Silence settled as they stared at each other intensely.

"You know what? Let's go to the wild."

"Bet."

In a stony area surrounded by hills, Roxy jumped high in the sky, dodging a swarm of sharp tendrils that washed the ground like a wave.

He was just a structureless swarm, but that didn't mean a weak point couldn't be targeted. She tightens her fist, ready to punch when she hits the ground.

The tendrils retracted last minute before the impact. Rocks became fine grind under her punch.

A big tendril pierces upward through the ground, aiming straight for the head which she dodged.

Invisible ones grabbed her ankles. A hard yank slams her one hundred eighty degrees onto her back.

A last one went to the finishing stab, inches from her eyes she trapped the tendril between her palms.

He retracted last minute, she got the chance to get up.

Still caution filled the air.

"Wrong move." She simply told.

The structureless form was the best bet against her, sharp tendrils that provide little surface area gave her fewer vulnerable spots to hit.

'Though with her, every spot is vulnerable.' His mind supplied to calculate his next move.

"Don't zone out~"

One heel balanced on the tip of a pointy tendril, closing off the distance.

In a split second swarm of them march toward her. He realized seconds too late he took the bait.

Just before they impale her she flicked one of them.

They all froze before reaching her, falling to the ground soon after.

"Wow, so sharp as usual!" She staggered while healing her bloody finger.

She turned to the ground, the tendrils recoiled on each other, forming the human shape.

His nervous system was glitching, limbs shivered uncontrollably.

"I think I hit you with 75%…whoopsie daisy." She covered her mouth cutely.

"W-well, I wanted the fight...but OW!"

After that they sat on a rock, munching on a giant puffball mushroom they found on the ground.

"Look at us now…"

"What happened man?"

"We used to have fun together."

"Now we just fight over bowls and dirty floors..." They sighed in unison.

"Maybe I should move out." He told.

"Please don't, at least not until the holidays pass."

"Ai and avocado stuff?"

"Yeah, I could use a 'my roommate got sick and can't leave him alone on a holiday excuse.'"

"Is it okay though?"

"Why not?"

"Aren't you afraid? I could eat you while you're asleep, considering how deep you sleep." He lowered his voice subconsciously.

"Nah, it's fine."

"Do you even comprehend dread?" He poked her cheek, careful with his long nail.

"I comprehend awesomeness though." She declared seriously.

He failed to mute a laugh, head sinking below his shaking shoulders. Their knees touching.

"I can't with you. You know what? You're my friend."

"But I can't understand or reciprocate that."

"Well too bad, it's my decision." He put his arm around her shoulder as they walked.

"Wait, that means I can use the words 'bestie' and 'bff' like human girls? All hail friendship!!" She raised her fists in the air.

'People can't be what you want them to be sometimes. That doesn't have to diminish what's between us I guess.'

At the general hospital the nameless surgeon heads out of the operation room. Washing his hands and sitting to fill files on the medical hexagono board.

"I'll book a follow-up surgery next Monday morning." He tells Jueno, the OR manager of their department who's using the board next to him.

"Can't do, there's maintenance on Monday morning."

"Why need maintenance every two days?"

"Why book in my OR then?"

They bickered as they filled the files. Jueno left abruptly as he came when his hexagono beeped.

He looked at the post surgery scans of the little patient.

'Adhesions still acute near the liver and abdomen. Lungs and kidney are looking better. Yeah, this gonna take at least two surgeries. Need an L3 surgeon with me.'

Entering an input on a hexagono was one thing, informing the patient's family was another.

'Now what kind of smile to plaster when telling a -new comer- parent that their child would need a series of surgeries? When said parent is still hospitalized themselves.'

He looked at the files in his work hexagono. A pair of mother and daughter arrived three days ago, acute injuries plus birth deformities and adhesions plagued the little one. Textbook L2 surgery series, not for the parent though.

"Good morning!" He chirped and the woman turned her head to him quickly, a mixture of all sorts of worry on her face.

"H-how is she, doc?" She stumbled on her words as she spat quickly.

"Everything's good, little Layla should wake up in a couple hours."

But he preferred ripping the band-aid off instead of stirring her worries after she got relief.

"But we gonna need another two surgeries to fix all the deformities and adhesions."

"T-two surgeries?" She visibly started spiraling into a panic.

"Yeah, there's adhesion on the left side and another on the right side. We can't open both sides on the same day." He pointed at his sides for a demonstration, then his eyes moved curiously to her vital signs.

With the pretending of adjusting her IV drip, the distraction did its job.

"It's a standard surgery series, nothing to worry about." A technically true statement.

"I see." Somewhat peaceful acceptance settled on her expression.

"Need help finishing that?" He looked at the orange milkshake antibiotic quenchy.

"It's too bad."

"I have a magic trick."

He washed his hands after closing her nose while she gulped the awful liquid.

'Phew, she took it better than I thought.'

A crying scream snapped him to the next room.

The young staff almost froze as the patient jolted in fear of the too big to be a needle instrument. Leaving a cannula half in her vein.

She shook in fear when anybody tried to come closer.

"Call the medical trauma dep." He murmured to the closest junior.

The needle had the atrophy dose installed already, and the vein won't handle any more sudden movements.

"I-I'm S-sorry! I didn't mean to I swear!" The patient apologized frantically as he grabbed gloves to wear.

"It's alright! I just need to adjust the cannula, can I?" The friendly demeanor was almost tone deaf to the tense situation. But fear couldn't be reasoned with and the dose wasn't supposed to stay in room temperature for too long.

He locked eye contact with her, prompting her breathing to slowly match his.

He approached as her nerves settled down a bit, though her eyes opened wide and her breath hitched when he touched the cannula.

"Did you finish the admission, ma'am?" He continued the tone deafness olympics.

"Y-Yes! I did it, put the documents and all, sir!" She answered quickly as she's defending herself from an upcoming punishment.

"That's great! We appreciate you!"

One youngster took mental notes as the surgeon's hands installed the needle instrument to the cannula pipe swiftly, while looking the patient in the eyes and nodding along. Hands so light the patient isn't feeling the big needle.

He dragged the admission conversation, asking about the waiting area and if the sofa was comfy and whatnot. It was a long injection after all.

Fortunately, it finished without any other hurdles.

"You owe me lunch later!" He told a coworker from the medical trauma department before going back.

"Surg! How did you do that?" The young guy from earlier asked.

"You connect your hexagono to the magnetic field of the instrument. Then you can see the veins when you're looking away. Ask a technician for that."

'So old school…'

"No, Surg. I meant how you make a needle like that painless?"

"Practice I guess." A technically true statement.

He kept it to himself that teachers used to tell him he got a 'light hand' so he honed in on that. A little too much some might say.

The minutes passed like hours, it was a busy day in a different sense. The new wave of newcomers wasn't massive in numbers. But each one admitted to the hospital had acute damage, physical or otherwise.

Tomorrow was his day off, so when he stepped outside the hospital his feet departed from the ground slightly.

"Come on, I want a shower first at least." He was already invisible but he floated to the bench out of habit.

The smoking buddy was in a burgundy dress with a bunch of red fruits embroidered on it and some lace work.

He sat next to her, unsure if she sensed him or not.

She was zoning out, an unlit pipe in her hand.

'She wears that look sometimes. Not thinking about anything cause there's so much to think about.'

A man walking with his two wives seemed to bring her back to the current moment.

"It must take a lot of social skills to be in a threesome." She told him out of nowhere.

"Wha-"

"No- like seriously!"

He just burst out laughing as she continued explaining her point about eye contact and social cues. By the time she was done, his head was in his arm, leaning on the bench's back. Lungs squeezed out, empty of air.

"Having many wives doesn't mean a threesome." He barely managed to say, wiping a tear.

"Really?"

He just gave up to another, shorter laughing fit. Not sure when he stopped being floaty.

"I can't...wanna grab a bite before everything closes?"

"Sure."

They walked in silence, which was soft and soothing between them, and the conversation when it happened was fun and unpredictable.

On the bench, in the street. Good company was good.

They soon saw Roxy and Ryu and their dusty clothes.

"You two duked it out huh?" He asked his younger brother.

"Yeah, we are no longer roommates." Ryu deadpanned.

"What?"

"Meet my BFF!" Roxy exclaimed.