Hiking gave Takehisa time to think.

Away from people, away from noise, away from anything that might be considered a remotely emotional attachment. Just some time to wander the inside of his own head, without the overhanging consequences of Being Responsible if he happened to veer a hard left into his most errant thoughts.

After all, between Ōbi and Maki, with Arthur as the extreme variance, they had enough people strolling around inside the abstract areas of their own heads already.

He was able to keep it well muzzled until he had some time alone; as such, the kitchen was his usual outlet for his errant thoughts, followed by regular firearm maintenance, cleaning around the cathedral, and the shower, in that exact order. Of course, the cathedral was rarely quiet except for the small hours, so even then he always had to keep his ears pricked for any impending lark that his subordinates could bring to bear.

Or his superior.

Make no mistake, Ōbi wasn't much better than the rest of them, he just had enough hard life lessons learned to make some semi-reasonable decisions, and was stubborn enough to bully his dreams into becoming reality. And somehow, he managed to routinely sweep Takehisa along for the ride.

Hence, when able, Takehisa went hiking, to give himself time to properly ruminate over how his life plans had gone quite so off-course.

And he made the distinction between off-course, and truly, irrevocably sideways; off-course simply meant that one had the opportunity to find a new, more direct way to get what you wanted. Because Ōbi was chasing a dream that nobody else had ever dared to truly try to hold in their hands—not a human alive could remember a time before human combustion was just part of the "natural" cycle—and here went this guy with something as farfetched as, "well, what if we just straight up put a stop to that?"

If anyone but Ōbi had pitched it, he would have discarded the thought. But Ōbi was ridiculous and stubborn and personable and almost a caricature of a model public servant, what with his honest, friendly nature and unwavering commitment to saving as many lives as possible. Except that he was very real, and Takehisa was under the distinct impression that was how he bamboozled people into willingly jumping onto the "we're gonna change the world" bandwagon.

Again, Takehisa most definitely included. He didn't think he'd been the type.

Also yes, this was the kind of stuff he thought about when he had a few spare moments to not have to look after anyone's wellbeing but himself. At least if he broke a leg not minding where he was going while on a hike because his mind was not at all walking at the same pace as the rest of him, he would only have himself to blame.

Ōbi would be so mad if he did, though.

…maybe he should break a leg after all, just so that the aggravation could run the other way for a while.

Hm, probably too extreme. A twisted ankle would most likely get the same over the top, loudly-worried reaction, and without him having to go through weeks of physical therapy.

What would happen if he just called and said he twisted his ankle? Straight up lie about it. For science.

It was nice to have the time to devote brain-space to inane things like this.

A lizard sitting on a nearby rock seemed to agree, at least as far as Takehisa's imagination would let him anthropomorphize as much. He managed to fish the camera out slowly and quietly enough to snap a photo.

Recently, he'd been saddled with an assignment when he was able to get away. Really, the word "assignment" was rather too harsh. It was really just a begged favor.

Vulcan was, Licht aside, probably the most self-contained of their residents. He had his projects, and his space, and other than letting his skulls and spikes aesthetic run away with him sometimes (and Ōbi did nothing to rein it in and everything to encourage it), he was fully competent in his abilities, both as an engineer and simply as someone who was fully able to take care of himself. Takehisa was sure that was curried both from having to tend to his own needs from a young age, and from putting upon himself to take care of others. Those kinds of things tended to either make people mature more quickly, or the exact opposite. Fortunately, Vulcan had his head on straight, and Takehisa very rarely worried about him, insofar as making trouble for anybody else.

Which meant that once Vulcan found out that Takehisa's favorite way to spend a day off was to retreat to the mountains, he begged him to take a camera (readily supplied by Vulcan himself, obviously) with him. "No big deal, I know this is your time away from all of us, but if you see any birds or anything and happen to remember…" Vulcan had shrugged. Takehisa had made a noncommittal sound.

That first time, he managed to snap a couple photos of some birds. Vulcan was, what Takehisa would consider, disproportionately ecstatic. Given his powerful love of the natural world, he'd figured that Vulcan had at least been outside the city to the wilderness once in his life. Apparently, that was not the case, and his knowledge of animals came from his voracious propensity for research and collecting as many zoological records as he could get his hands on, as well as what he could observe at city parks. And he was very observant. Still…

The next trip out, Takehisa managed to find fresh hoof prints in a game trail, and track them to where a deer had been able to find a small seep in a hillside for water.

Vulcan gushed over the photos for about a week straight. Even Licht was done hearing about it after four days.

Takehisa had expected to feel slightly more put upon about it; hiking was his time, and he tended to guard it as jealously as any of the rest of them guarded theirs.

Which… wasn't actually the case, was it? Because Maki always offered to pick something up from the store on her way back from staying with her parents, and Ōbi and Iris had an adventure in "steam cleaning the floors" of the station when they had some time to themselves—of all the people to be mad at together, they were, quite frankly, the last on Takehisa's list, holy hell, because of course Ōbi wasn't keen on reading instructions and as such it went about as awry as possible—and Shinra was willing to run errands while he was out, and Licht had done something duplicitous to make their next batch of supplies from Hijima cost absolutely nothing, and…

And Takehisa didn't mind doing something as simple and low-energy as some minor photo-documenting of his camping trips, if it made Vulcan so unbearably happy.

Is this how Ōbi felt all the time, nursemaiding after the kids all day? Hmph, he'd need a second trip out here now, just to think over it.

As expected, the lizard photo was a hit. Vulcan might have just created several (more) lizard-shaped tools in his unadulterated ecstasy. A testament to his genius, lizard-hafted flathead screwdriver was the most ergonomic of the lot, and everyone in the cathedral fought to use that one if they needed it. Once he had finally gotten ahold of it himself, Takehisa had turned over slowly in his hands. As usual, the attention to detail was utterly astounding. Good eyes, indeed. And good hand-eye coordination, considering that both Shinra and Arthur still got a little hyperalert whenever Vulcan would idly toss cans around.

Deep down, where he nursed projects that had little use other than for slaking his own amusement, he quietly stoked the idea of dragging Vulcan to the range, putting a gun in his hands, and seeing what the engineer could hit with it.

With bullets, not the actual gun.

Hm, maybe a bad idea after all. Even if Vulcan was far and away smart enough to realize that Takehisa intended for him to shoot the gun and not throw the gun, enough nonsense bubbled out of his subordinates on a regular basis that he never took common sense for granted.

But still. Good eyes. Priorities well sorted. And a genuine love of the outdoors, despite having very little experience with it.

Which may have been why Takehisa opened his mouth the next time leave was dolled out, and asked if Vulcan wanted to go to the mountains with him this time.

Vulcan had given him a wide-eyed stare. Takehisa would almost consider the expression to be wary.

"Are you serious?"

"Yes, I am." And Takehisa had to bite down quickly on a reflexive, coldly sarcastic I didn't realize I had a stutter, that wouldn't do anything to convince someone of his sincerity unless their name was Ōbi, who wasn't intimidated by him enough to be spooked by a little sass. Unfortunately.

Vulcan had looked almost nervous, rubbing the back of his neck.

"That sounds amazing, quite frankly." He ran his hand roughly through his hair. "But I kinda don't wanna leave—"

"Absolutely not." And Lisa made a show of dropping the hardcover book in her hands loudly onto a metal table, to make sure she had Vulcan's complete attention. It worked. Takehisa made notes. "You will absolutely not use me as an excuse avoid going to have some fun. I refuse to let you coward out of this opportunity because you think I'm going to shatter at a moment's notice." She turned to the lieutenant, hands on her hips. "Yes, he would love to go camping with you."

In Vulcan's defense, had the roles been reversed, Takehisa would absolutely have dug in his heels and refused to be moved from his self-imposed guard post protecting the wellbeing of someone important to him. Which meant that watching this exchange happen in front of him was far more interesting than irritating.

Poor Vulcan looked painfully torn and uncomfortable.

"Lisa…"

"I won't hear it." It was the firmest and most stubborn that he had seen her be since she arrived, which was a good thing. It meant she finally felt comfortable enough to show that steel backbone, which was somewhat of a requirement in this place. "If I go completely to pieces within twenty-four hours, then I am not at all cut out to be here. Go, we all know you want to." Her steel spine faltered just slightly, like she still wasn't sure of this next part. "Besides, I won't be alone. I know where company is, if I need it."

Because Iris was pretty non-threatening, and Ōbi was nothing if not both approachable and relatively unintrusive, and with both of them still in the cathedral she'd at least be looked after.

The part of Takehisa's brain that always kicked around the possibility of Infernals—and now White Clad—threatening the cathedral when most of the crew was away did acknowledge that the three of them could probably hold their own surprisingly well. Having Iris in attendance made putting Infernals to rest legal, and with Ōbi as front guard and melee and Lisa as midrange attacker, they could probably actually give a would-be threat a serious run for their money.

In all honesty, Company 8 would technically be offline until they were done with leave, so dispatches in their district would be duly covered by the First, Forth, and Fifth, all of which now contained trustworthy (enough) allies. That, and Ōbi was never more adept at crushing the square peg of Luck through the round hole of Reality than when he had people at his back to protect, but that was a mental tangent he could jump on tomorrow; he had hours of hiking ahead of him.

"Well, guess that has been decided for me," although the engineer didn't look even the least bit displeased. "What should I bring?"

"I'm glad you asked." He pulled a piece of paper off his clipboard and handed it to Vulcan. "Here's your shopping list. I already have everything else we'll need."

Takehisa may have said 'shopping list' but he was well aware, and Vulcan was probably well aware that he was aware, that anything he didn't have he was just going to make, and all before tomorrow morning.

In the interest of full disclosure, that was partly why Takehisa gave it to him. His curiosity did get regularly sated watching Vulcan build something from almost nothing, and of far superior quality to anything a respectable amount of money could buy.

He was slightly wary when Vulcan stuffed something into his backpack after Lisa handed it to him with a, "hey, don't forget your turkey." Which meant that it could be anything, but he supposed he would find out about that in due time.

They left early the next morning, punctually and without interference. Takehisa also insisted on doing the driving out to the foothills. Partially because he already knew the way—even if Vulcan was very good at following instructions—and partially because of this reaction right here, where Vulcan's face became progressively more mashed into the glass the closer they got to their destination. He was almost suspiciously quiet, even as he was practically squirming in his seat with barely-restrained excitement, and Takehisa was finally feeling the first twinges of regret bringing someone else along in what was usually a very quiet trip, and he almost dreaded what was going to happen when he parked and unleashed the young engineer into the unsuspecting wilderness.

He was glad to prove himself wrong, and to be assured that his first instinct was, in fact, the correct one.

Despite being excited and currently possessing extremely high energy, Vulcan still possessed what Takehisa would consider a higher than average amount of good sense, coupled with the ability to read people fairly well. Once they had unpacked their stuff and locked the vehicle, they spent the next half hour going over their plan, the map, making sure Vulcan could read a compass and had plenty of water on him, before Takehisa cut his leash and let him go. And oh boy, did he go. Camera in one hand, binoculars in the other, modest notepad and a pencil between his teeth, and he didn't even make it to the trailhead. Just did an almost-graceful swan dive face-first into a bush, just to see if there was anything there. Takehisa let him be; he'd be fine.

And he was indeed fine. The whole morning was a combination of Vulcan eventually catching up to him, because he could actually be trusted to read and follow the map, and falling behind again when he found one or another thing to stare at, photograph, or take notes on. And he didn't attempt to fill Takehisa's ear with chatter even once, so absorbed with taking as much of the wilderness in as he possibly could that he could not be assed to bother his guide. Which, in turn, suited Takehisa just fine. He had plenty of things to roll around in his own head today.

Some time around noon, there was a dip in the trail; it was familiar enough, Takehisa had come this way many times, and expected the soft, clay soil at the bottom that never seemed to fully dry out. Given the nature of the ground here, he figured he'd probably lose Vulcan to this spot for a good hour or so, since the clay picked up animal tracks better than most other trails nearby.

A quick check while minding his footing confirmed that there were some very interesting tracks here today. Hm.

He wasn't sure if it would actually work, but he put his fingers to his lips and whistled anyways. It was the same cadence and series of tones he used to get his soldiers' attention when he really needed it. Vulcan was not a soldier, not by training, and may have his head too far in a hole under a tree to hear him anyhow.

To his immense and silent delight, that did not stop him from galloping around the corner anyways. With dirt all over his shirt. Takehisa had been goddamned kidding about the hole under the tree.

Dirtier and sweatier, yes, but Vulcan otherwise didn't look like he had lost much energy at all in the last few hours. Youth was one hell of a drug.

"Is there a problem, Lieutenant?"

"No, not a problem." He set down his backpack on a nearby rock, and knelt near the muddy, clay imprints. "But it is a good reminder about why we will be taking precautions with storing our food this evening." And he gestured to a large set of tracks that clearly stood out from the others.

"Oh damn." Ever astute, it did not take Vulcan long at all to realize why they were important. He shed his own bag, but only so that he could pull a small field guide and a tape measure (of course) from one of the many pockets. It looked very much like the engineer was currently wishing for more arms as well, since he suddenly found himself trying to juggle those items into the rotation of camera/binoculars/notebook that he already had in hand. "Given the size of the print, it looks like… U. t. japonicus? A subspecies of black bear that used to live here and all over the Asian continent before the Cataclysm."

Takehisa likened it to taking a naturalist out into the woods, who had never actually been to the woods before, but who had his head stuffed so full of knowledge that the only way to possibly tell that he had never experienced these things before was the starry eyed wonder with which he regarded everything.

And clearly he had been inside his own head for long enough today; "likened" his ass, that was exactly what was happening here.

"Mm. You still see signs of them once in a while out here."

Vulcan looked at him, wide-eyed.

"You ever see one, actually?"

"Yes. A few times. Most of my good fortune spotting them has been around the twilight hours, but they're opportunistic, and will come out whenever there's a good chance to eat."

"I know I said 'all over', but while their native range was pretty big, apparently they used to be really rare pre-Cataclysm, due to overhunting and habitat loss." Vulcan tossed his guidebook back into his pack, left the measuring tape next to the prints for scale, and fished his camera back out. "Because of their smaller size, they are now more common that the U. a. lasiotus, which needed more food to survive, and hasn't done so well post-Cataclysm. Not that either species is doing particularly great in the last couple centuries, all things considered." He tossed Takehisa another look. "You ever see one of them? The big ones?"

"Only once. And much further north than we are here." He ran a hand idly through his hair. That had been… an event. Also yes, they were big. "A mother with cubs, so I didn't stick around." He had been fortunate to have been just far enough away that she hadn't considered him to be an immediate threat.

"Aw." And it was the same tone Vulcan used with the stray cats out back. And snails rescued from Iris' garden. And pigeons on the roof. And apparently now bears. "That sounds so cool. Nature finds a way."

"The more remote we get, the more likely we are to encounter bears." Takehisa shouldered up his backpack again, pinning Vulcan under a look as he did so; not to be punitive, but for the safety of all involved he needed to hear it. "I know you want to stay quiet to not frighten off all the other animals, but don't be too quiet as you walk. The last thing you want to do is turn a corner and startle a bear. Given the chance, if they hear you coming, they'll just leave. Given how fresh those tracks are, and that no other tracks cross over them, that particular bear may not be too far away."

Vulcan barely rolled the words over in his head before nodding.

"Okay. Yeah, that makes sense." And Takehisa had the next portion of his hike to ponder watching someone with as wild and powerful emotional swings as Ōbi also be somewhat of a pragmatist, as long as you could convince him the ideas made sense. "How much further?"

"We still have about another four hours of walking, if we keep a good pace." He had to resist dipping into the same timbre that he used when his rookies dared try to whisper about being exhausted behind his back while he had them up on the roof. "I hope you're not getting tired on me already."

"Nope, this is a blast." Vulcan slid his own pack back on, a shade more reluctantly. "Buuuuuuut… when do we break for lunch?"

Takehisa… wasn't opposed to this idea, actually, and canted his head up the rest of the trail.

"We can do that. In about another two hundred meters, there's a better place to sit down, if you'd like."

"Sure thing! Don't wait for me, I'm just gonna take a few more photos here first…"

Yes, of course he was.

In reality, Takehisa only ended up beating Vulcan to the break site by about ten minutes. More than enough time to have solidly broken into lunch by the time the engineer got there, but short enough that he didn't really mind the few minutes rest. He did draw the line once Vulcan started feeding bits of his food to the local ravens, who very swiftly learned which of the two humans on the hillside were going to spoil them.

"I'm going on ahead. Please try not to fall too far behind."

Vulcan only grunted in response, duly distracted.

This was rather what he took trips out here to avoid, wasn't it? Having to look after other people? Because sometimes he just needed a damned break. Seeing to all these kids could give even the most energetic person a run for their money. Worry was a very tiring emotion.

But on the other hand…

He didn't completely regret this. Because Vulcan was able to both give him his space and stay just close enough to not make Takehisa's imagination conjure up images of him with a broken leg somewhere, competent enough to both completely mind his own business but give just enough signs that he was not going to simply wander off, get lost, and prove that he required any more supervision than he had already been given.

It was really quite freeing to have company that didn't throw his lofty expectations back in his face in some way.

The rest of the hike way up towards the backside of the ridge went without incident, and in much the same manner as the previous hours had gone, with Takehisa keeping the steady pace, and Vulcan wherever he felt like being.

There was a marked slowing of his energetic back and forth the closer to evening they got, though. Takehisa wasn't sure if he was pleased or disappointed that Vulcan hadn't been able to keep that manic activity up for the whole day.

It was shortly after sixteen hundred hours by the time they made it to their camping spot, which aligned pretty well with the best of Takehisa's estimations. He shed his backpack on a large rock, found his usual patch of decently-flat ground, removed the rocks, and beckoned Vulcan over. Teaching him how to properly set up a tent was basically just a courtesy; as expected, Vulcan's obscenely high mechanical aptitude meant that he could probably just look at the pile of disassembled tent and put it together with no problems whatsoever. Which would have been moderately droll to watch.

But also, giving Vulcan unrestrained permission to set something up as he saw fit left the door open to modifications, and Takehisa liked his tent just the way it was, thank you very much.

One tent down, and suddenly Vulcan's energy came roaring back, as he upended his pack to pull out the bundle from before.

His "turkey."

Oh no.

Oh shit.

Takehisa should have known, but he had duly anticipated this, hadn't he? After all, he distinctly remembered that he didn't anticipate Vulcan would actually buy a single thing he brought with him.

The "turkey," after all, was Vulcan's tent.

That's it, it was just a giant turkey.

Yes, it was also a fully-functional tent.

Yes, it was probably also the most structurally-sound tent ever built to date.

…it was just shaped. Like a giant. Goddamn. Turkey.

Complete with flapping snood and Vulcan's characteristic googley eyes.

Takehisa stared, because there was naught else to do in this particular situation. Watching as Vulcan smoothly put it together. Huh, that was odd, and would give him a way to fill the silence, because he should probably say something.

"I'm surprised it doesn't self-deploy."

Vulcan had his hands on his hips, admiring his handiwork.

"I seriously considered it, but for my first trip out, I figured I should know how to set one up the original way. Also, that would let me know if I built it right." He grinned over his shoulder. "Turkey 2.0 will be fully auto-deployable, though."

"Hm." After the initial shock of seeing it, it was slowly dulling into the normal background of "things Vulcan makes that slowly turns our workspace into a mechanical zoo."

At least the turkey didn't have any spikes on it.

The evening went smoothly, mostly. As expected of almost any young person on their first camping trip, Vulcan was enthusiastic about finding things to burn in the campfire. Takehisa got to enjoy his good fortune of having someone younger than himself to make get the bear bag up into the tree as he washed the dishes. Very little disrupted the peace, as Vulcan now apparently had a lot of new material to spur his creativity, as he had given his pencil and notepad very little rest between tasks. Upside to having someone nearby to mind the campsite was that he could go a bit further afield as he strolled around at dusk.

He made it about thirty yards away, up by the edge of a nearby precipice down a steep hill, before turning on his heel and heading right back towards his things. He grabbed his rifle bag, and tapped Vulcan on the shoulder.

"Come, and quietly. But not too quietly."

It took a fraction of a second for Vulcan to get the hint, and he shed everything in his lap in his haste to jump up, fumble his camera out of his bag, and follow close behind.

At the cliff edge, Takehisa knelt, canting his head down the hill.

"Looks like they were headed the same way we were."

About sixty-five yards down the embankment, digging through the underbrush, was a large mass of black fur that looked to weigh a good hundred kilos or so. If they had been noticed, the bear clearly found whatever was buried in the bushes to be far more compelling than the two humans sitting at the top of the hill.

Vulcan was, predictably, ecstatic. Quietly ecstatic.

"That is so cool." And he put his camera to his face and took all of one photo before letting it drop again, giving Takehisa's busy hands a piercing stare. "Wait. Is that your rifle bag?"

"Yes." He had no reason to hide it, assembling his shotgun with practiced smoothness. It had been a while since he had brought out this one.

The color drained from Vulcan's face at a speed that made him have some concern that the engineer might suddenly keel over from the amount of blood leaving his head.

"…you wouldn't. You're not—!"

"Only in the event of an emergency. You cannot always tell with bears." And he spared a moment to toss one of his munitions into Vulcan's hands.

"What is this?" He turned the strange, plastic round over shakily.

"Bean bag shot. Worst it will do is cause some bruising. Fortunately, black bears are easily frightened off with less-than-lethals, unless they think they cannot escape." He took the round back, loading it into his shotgun. "Ōbi would actually fight with me, truly, if I allowed you to be mauled by a bear under my watch."

The engineer was still visibly shaken, but nominally less so.

"Can't you just… dampen the velocity of your bullets?"

"Yes, but it is easier to recover these white beanbags after discharging them, instead of leaving bullets out to possibly be eaten by animals who like shiny things, all the more so if the bullets leach lead."

The color came back to Vulcan's face all at once and Takehisa, again, worried he might faint at a moment's notice. He gave a loud sigh, and scrubbed a hand through his hair.

"You terrified me there, for a moment."

Takehisa gave him a sideways glance.

"Just for a moment? I'm losing my touch."

Vulcan gave him a slow grin, firmly back in good spirits.

"I get jokes now, too? Nobody back at base is going to believe me. They'll think I was having fever dreams from exposure."

"Good. The day Shinra and Arthur stop being afraid of me is the day I retire."

"So never, then."

Takehisa took a more comfortable position sitting on the ground, shotgun laying across his lap.

"That is currently the goal."

Vulcan followed his lead, and they spent the next few minutes watching the bear poke around this bush and that log and Vulcan finally exhausted however much room he had on the storage for his camera, with a disappointed hiss. It soon didn't matter, as the now rapidly-dwindling light meant that he had to be content just looking through his binoculars regardless. If Takehisa knew anything, they were probably night-vision-capable, anyways.

After a while, the engineer broke the silence with a soft snort.

"Thanks," and he made a vague, lazy gesture with one arm in an almost three-hundred and sixty degree circle, "for… all of this. I know I'm edging into your escapism, but I do appreciate this."

He had figured as much, but it was nice to get verbal confirmation of the gratitude.

"Well, you haven't made me really regret it, so you're welcome."

Vulcan gave another snort, before a half-smirk danced across his face.

"…What do you think would happen if you brought the whole crew out here?"

"Stop." And he gave Vulcan a glare that was right on the cusp between serious and not. Not that many others were able to tell, and he would keep it that way. "I refuse to think about such nonsense out here."

And he did. A camping trip dragging the entire company along behind him?

Preposterous.

AN:

I promised both last chapter, and here is both.

By Primus, I am rusty at writing Hinawa, how the hell did that happen.

My normal proofreader is having a good dose of Life at the moment, and instead of being patient I just threw this up here. I'm going to guess there are at least twenty typos in this thing, no kidding.

Also, because today (May 4th) is National Firefighter Day in the US, and I refuse to not put something out today, of all days. Also, my muses finally let me work with them.

I like to think that both Ōbi and Hinawa like Vulcan because he is a remarkable amalgam of both their personalities, and they can each see enough of themselves in him to be like, "yes, this kid has his ducks in a row." I haven't yet decided if I will have Vulcan catch onto this.

I have a huge list of about fourteen more prompts, and many of them are just lark, so we'll see what falls out of me next. XD

Typo gremlin traps set, gonna go to bed, we'll see what I catch when I wake up and can see straight again.