A/N - Hey guys, so this is a collab between me and Abish. We recently finished with watching DGM and Poker Pair is totally sex, so we decided to work on this! Since this story is written by two authors, the notes we write will differentiate by my notes having an "S:" and for her notes having an "A:" in front of them. c:
S: Since this is a mental ward fic, there's gonna be some terms that you may or may not know. Anything important that you'll need to know, we'll be sure to explain in the story. And keep in mind we aren't actually educated in any of this stuff, so sorry if it's inaccurate. The internet is your best friend for information!
A: I, for one, love the internet.
Name: Mana Walker
Date of Birth: 8/23/68
Patient previously enlisted in the Black Order Health Institute for continual insistence of his age being seventeen as opposed to forty-three. Recognizes adopted son Allen Walker as previously deceased dog with shared name. Shows signs of bipolarity, including occasional maniac episodes as shown by his aggressive behavior during an incident at the carnival, explained more thoroughly on next page. Primarily diagnosed with Schizoaffective Disorder by Dr. Komui Lee for aforementioned delusions involving his age and adopted son. Possibly suffers mild case of pyromania.
Plan: Stabilize patient with anti-psychotic medication Clozapine. Stay at the Noah Psychiatric Hospital extended to an undefined period of time. Electro-Convulsive Therapy to be conducted if patient's case rises in severity. If mental state continues to fail in improvement, psychosurgery will be planned.
Tyki Mikk skimmed the first page of the file nonchalantly as he dragged his finger down the lines of text. The monotonous wall of one-size-too-small text was almost indistinguishable from any other patient chart fortunate enough to be picked out of the endless list of folders perfectly aligned on his desk. It was nothing he hadn't seen before.
How boring. Although, recognizing your son as a dog was certainly a strange thought. Then again, nothing was ever too bizarre when you worked in a mental institution.
Finally nearing the end of the report, the name of the medication briefly caught his interest. Tyki thought he remembered his niece Road babbling something about Clozapine in one of her long-winded drawls about drugs. Something or other about some serious side effects to go with its effectiveness. If his memory wasn't failing him, seizures were commonly associated with it. But medicine was Road's fortè, not his, so hell if he really cared.
A gloved hand flipped the page over so he could continue to read.
Mana Walker was visiting a local carnival with adopted son, Allen Walker, on January 3rd. He previously was sent to the Black Order Health Institute, but showed enough improvement to be dispatched from the institute itself. He regularly returned for check-ups and to receive medication. During one of the acts of the circus set up in the center of the carnival, Walker got a hold of one of the burners being used to light the decorative torches. In a bout of what appears to be a pyromania-esque fixation branched from his Schizoaffective Disorder, he attempted to light the circus tent on fire. His son managed to take the burner away from him before more damage could be done, but the tent caught aflame and Allen Walker's left arm was burnt in the process. To avoid amputation of the limb, a primarily successful surgery was performed. As of now the arm is covered in scar tissue. The incident caused widespread panic at the carnival and proved Walker's condition severe enough to transfer into the Noah Psychiatric Hospital, where he currently resides.
Tyki raised an eyebrow at the summary of events before flipping the page over once more to view the pictures. There were several photos of Walker and his son before the event at the carnival, featuring Mana as a tall, dark-haired, clean looking man. Not someone you would expect to be mental at first glance, but most of their patients weren't. The photos of Allen showed a young teenage boy, with strange snowy white locks and an interesting star-shaped scar that marred the flesh above his left eye and extended in a crooked streak down his face.
The next pictures were taken during Mana's little episode. There were a few of the tent shrouded in flames, the people around it either staring in shock or panicking. More pictures were taken as Allen Walker was placed on a stretcher and carried into an arriving ambulance. His face was contorted into an expression of extraordinary pain, but perhaps that would be an understatement. Tyki then came across the photos showcasing Allen's left arm after surgery. The tissue surrounding his arm was gnarled and red, and his nails were burnt into a dead black.
Not a very pretty sight. Tyki almost could have winced. Poor kid. The wavy-haired man only dwelled on it for a moment longer before sighing and opening the door to the hallway. He ran a hand through his tresses as he made his way to Room 168, where Mana would supposedly be situated. As he passed by the front desk, he held up a hand in greeting to the woman behind the desk.
"Hey, sis."
The black-haired woman looked up at him behind her dark, rounded shades. Her black suit bore a small name tag reading 'Lulubell'. "You have a new patient?" she inquired.
"Yep," he confirmed. "Some nut that set a tent and his son on fire."
Lulubell didn't bother to reply as she resumed filling in blanks on information sheets. In response, Tyki continued on his not-so-merry way to help a man he didn't give a crap about. His life was great.
In truth, Tyki couldn't care less if all the patients in the hospital simultaneously dropped dead. He was only in this business because he was good at it, it raked in a lot of cash, and he had a duty to fulfill to his family to help them make even more money. Or something like that. He'd be damned if any of those pathetic patients meant anything to him.
Stepping in front of the door to Room 168, he pulled open the handle and walked inside. Unsurprisingly, the middle-aged man from the photos awaited him, strewn across the bed, gray eyes focused on the ceiling. The overhead lamp had been switched off and the only source of light in the room filtered through the bars on a window too high up for a grown man's fingertips to reach and too small for a toddler to fit through.
"Hello," Tyki greeted pleasantly as he shut the door behind him. Mana's attention was caught and his eyes slid over to him. His lips turned up into a polite smile.
"Good morning," the man returned, the bed creaking as he sat up.
"If you can guess, I'm the doctor you were assigned. They've already run any tests you needed, so I'm just here to make sure your medicine is working and see that you don't die or go more insane," Tyki bluntly breezed through the basics, leaving out any mention of potential side-effects or risks. If the treatment worked, it worked. Whether or not the man knew made no difference in his eyes.
"Hmm," Mana mused. For a few moments he absentmindedly stared into space. "Do you know where Allen is?" He continued to speak as if Tyki had said nothing at all.
He arched an eyebrow. "The boy? Don't know," Tyki answered as he took a seat on one of the chairs near the wall, vaguely wishing for a cigarette. "He'll probably come around here sometime. Maybe soon, maybe not."
It seemed to Tyki that Mana was somewhat speaking to himself rather than the other man in the room, but his job insisted that he humor the man anyways. Leaning his elbow against the arm of the chair, Tyki lazily flipped open Mana's file and golden eyes scanned over the pre-written questions he was provided with to ask Mana. The man more than likely wasn't even listening to anything Tyki said, but it was a procedure he was forced to follow.
"I have some questions I need you to answer now," he explained, focusing his gaze on Mana. The man on the bed nodded for him to continue. "Do you remember what happened at the carnival two weeks ago?"
Mana appeared to be in thought, but said nothing. When he didn't receive much of a response from him, Tyki simply moved onto the next question. He wrote down that Mana gave no response.
"Who is Allen Walker?" Tyki read straight off the chart. Mana's eyes lit up in recognition, and his response came quickly.
"Do you know Allen too?" he questioned. "Were you his friend?"
"Not really," was all Tyki said. That counted as an answer to the question, didn't it? He didn't really want to bother. Sheril would probably have a cow that he failed to make an effort again when he read it, but he could just inform him that Road was being raped and off he would go.
His brother was so easy to deal with.
Scribbling down Mana's response, he continued to read off questions and he continued to get fairly unsatisfactory answers from the more or less distant man. And finally, after what seemed like endless hours of questioning, there were no more lines of text to read off. So by default, he no longer had to fraternize with Mana until the next day..
As Tyki shut the folder closed after recording his last answer, Mana shot him a quizzical look.
"Are you done?" he asked as if he was confused at the sudden cease of inquiries. Tyki shrugged.
"Basically. For today, anyways." Tyki brushed his pants off as he stood up. "Later." He waved briefly before walking to the door and opening it.
He was greeted with a boy bursting in through the door. Tyki blinked. Was that...white hair?
"Mana!" the white-haired boy greeted, as he made his way around Tyki to stand in front of the bed. "I'm sorry I couldn't visit you earlier, but the doctors at the hospital kept insisting that I stayed."
"Oh there you are, Allen," smiled Mana as he perked up. "I was waiting for you. Did they feed you well at the hospital while I was away?"
On closer inspection now that the figure in front of him wasn't a blur rushing by him, he was clearly the boy in the photos, although the hair should have been a dead giveaway from the start. Apart from the snapshots in the file, he looked oddly familiar...Tyki's eyebrows furrowed in thought.
"Heh, I guess you could say that," Allen replied as a bright smile played across his features.
The metaphorical light bulb of realization illuminated the dark hollows of Tyki's mind, and he almost felt like snapping his fingers. "Oh, you're that boy that keeps visiting the brain-dead father in Room 92!"
Said boy turned around to face Tyki for the first time, looking skeptical. "Yeah, I am. How did you know?"
"It's hard to miss you with that interesting head of hair, boy," he grinned. He chucked a bit at Allens look of slight indignation. "I didn't mean it in a bad way, so don't take it to heart. Where's your other redheaded half?"
"Lavi?" Allen blinked. "He's actually visiting Suman in Room 92 right now, I think. I told him that I'd meet up with him after checking up on how Mana was doing. Speaking of which, you're the doctor, so how is he doing?"
Tyki allowed himself a moment to decide what to say. "Doesn't really say too much. He usually asks about you when he does speak, though."
Allen's monochrome irises swept over the contents of the room before resting once more on the smiling face of Mana Walker. Mana's arm was outstretched towards Allen as if beckoning him over.
"Come here, Allen," Mana coaxed, reaching his hand out further towards the boy. Allen's smile didn't falter as he obliged and carefully stepped across the spotless floor towards his adoptive father.
He took a seat next to Mana who placed his hand affectionately on top of his son's chalky locks, stroking his hair in a petting motion. Tyki skeptically watched the display.
"So he really does see the boy as a dog," he muttered to himself. Allen caught onto the barely audible words and swiveled around to face Tyki, frowning slightly.
"So what?"
The corner of Tyki's lips quirked upwards and he mockingly held up his hands in a placating gesture. "Just thinking to myself. All I've been doing is making potential jabs at you, sorry about that, boy. I hope you don't get too easily offended."
Allen's frown faded as he stared at Tyki in an essentially unimpressed manner, but eventually he gave a small, amused chuckle. "Not really."
"How lucky for me," he drawled. "If you're going to visit your friend in Suman's room, would you wrap things up here already?"
"Huh? Why?" Allen sounded disappointed. "I practically just got here."
"Let's not over exaggerate, it's been at least ten minutes," Tyki chided civilly, earning him a pointed look from the boy. How cute. "In all seriousness, I've finished here with Mana, and I need to move onto the next patient. The nurses won't be coming by his room until later, and we aren't supposed to leave visitors alone with the patients, so you'll have to leave too."
Allen looked as if he wanted to pout, but refrained as he conceded, turning back to Mana and pulling him into a hug. "Sorry, I have to leave now. I'm going to join a friend in one of the other rooms, but I'll definitely be back tomorrow. So I'll see you later, Mana."
A wispy smile adorned the older man's face. "Ah, I understand. I'll miss you, Allen. Take care and make sure you stay out of trouble."
Allen laughed. "Okay, I'll do that." And with that he pulled away from his father, following Tyki out the door.
"That was very touching," Tyki commented as they walked down the hallway. Allen rolled his eyes, smiling a little, and didn't bother replying. Silence accompanied the two as they made their ways through the building, passing by various patients and doctors alike.
After a little while, Allen couldn't help himself. He turned his head and looked at Tyki strangely. "Is it just me, or are you following me?"
Honey eyes blinked. "What?"
"We've been going down this same path for some time now," Allen explained almost bemusedly.
"That's probably due to that fact that we're headed towards the same room, boy," pointed out Tyki, gazing outside the passing window enviously as he eyed a man smoking leisurely outside. Damn this institute and their no-smoking laws.
"...Really?" Allen looked as if he hadn't considered the possibility. "Huh. But you were never the doctor that took care of Suman before."
Tyki smirked over at Allen. "Don't act so surprised, custody of patients fluctuate in the blink of an eye."
"Oh," was all Allen responded before an aura of uneasy silence encompassed the two. A moment later, he turned his head towards the curly haired man, his face contorting into what reminded Tyki of a sulking child. "I have a name, you know. I'll gladly repeat it if you try to remember, at the very least."
"Sure, I'll remember the name of each and every visitor who comes around. That's on the top of my priority list, kid. Here we are." On cue, he stepped forward and opened the door to Room 92, allowing the now-irked Allen to enter first, huffing in indignation, before walking in himself.
"Oh, Allen! You finally made it!" was the first thing heard as they entered the dreary room. The remark came from the grinning redhead sitting by the bed, where a nurse was finishing up changing the sheets for the still man sitting on it. One emerald eye glittered happily, while the other was hidden from view with an eye patch.
"Hi, Lavi," greeted Allen happily, easily returning a smile. "How is Suman doing?"
Lavi shrugged. "Same old, same old. The only thing he's really done is slobber all over the sheets." Allen chuckled a bit, then sighed.
"I wish that he would show some improvement so that we could actually deliver some good news to Lenalee," he said wistfully as he sat down next to Lavi.
"You said it, man," his friend agreed whole-heartedly as they both watched the nurse gather up the old sheets and make her way out the door.
"Nice to see you, Dr. Mikk. I've been waiting so that I could hand this to you," she addressed as she passed by him. She picked up a manila folder from a chair and handed it to him. "All of Suman Dark's files are in there." He nodded absentmindedly in return as she left, flipping the pages until he found the question sheet.
Tyki sighed as he pulled up a chair in front of the bedside. "Hello, Suman."
No reply was uttered from the man on the bed. His unfocused, glazed eyes stared at two different points in the room.
"Kids, this might get a little boring for you," he stated dully to the two boys as he prepared to start the questioning. The pair nodded in understanding; they had sat through the questioning of Suman before. Suman hardly moved and never spoke, let alone answered a doctor's interrogation.
And as he routinely read through the questions, Suman, meeting Tyki's rock bottom expectations, proved to be as unresponsive as ever.
"Finally," he breathed as the last inquiry was uttered. He eternally despised questioning, it was always a complete and utter bore. Once in a while, he would have the honor of questioning a dementia patient who would drone on and on about her son metamorphosing into a gorilla and singing for her cat's tragic funeral. How absolutely interesting. He scrawled his report on the sheet of paper given to him.
Suman didn't say jack shit. When has he ever said jack shit? He is a drooling lump of flesh, much like you. Sheril, you are a dolt. Please die.
Allen and Lavi exchanged curious glances as they watched Tyki scribble furiously. Allen lifted himself off the chair and walked behind the doctor, glancing over his shoulder to read the writing.
"...Wow. Pleasant," he deadpanned as he deciphered Tyki's words.
"I try," Tyki returned smoothly, unfazed by the sudden appearance of the boy.
"What'd it say?" pestered Lavi from his seat inquisitively, leaning forward a bit.
"Basically it's a promise of death," the white-haired boy explained. "Complete with vulgar words and everything." Lavi snickered.
"You sound like you care about your job," he pointed out.
"Not really," Tyki droned, leaning back in his chair. He either didn't hear the sarcasm or chose to ignore it entirely. "It's more exasperating than anything else."
Allen once again gave him an all-around unimpressed glance. "Shouldn't it feel rewarding to help remedy all these people who need you?"
"I suppose it should," mused Tyki, chortling. "But if it works out in the end though, can you really complain?"
An eyebrow rose. "And you really feel that way?" Before Tyki could bother to think of an acceptable response, an unfamiliar, shrill ringtone sounded throughout the room.
"That's mine," Lavi muttered as he fumbled to grab the phone from his pocket. He slid open the cover and ran his eye briefly across the message displayed on the screen. "Hey, Allen. That was the gramps, he said I'm dead meat if I skip out on my shift again. I'm your ride out of here, so we gotta bounce."
"Oh, alright," his companion sighed, standing up alongside the redhead. "Bookman can get crabby at times."
"If that's not an understatement, I don't know what is," groaned Lavi dramatically as he pulled open the door hinge and walked out. Allen followed, but before shutting the door behind him, he pivoted around to face Tyki with a pleasantly amused smile on his face.
"It was nice meeting you, Dr. Mikk," he mentioned in a mockery of the nurse previously stationed in the room.
Tyki chuckled, waving at him idly. "Whatever you say, boy."
Allen made sure to slam the door on the way out. Vaguely, Tyki heard his muffled voice yell through the door, "It's Allen!"
Tyki's lips curled up into a smirk.
A/N -
S: And that's it for the first chapter! Hope you enjoyed. *u* Please feed us with reviews!
A: These words are filled with love. ;A;