Normally, the prospect of being able to have extra time to oneself that was spent away from work would be appealing to most— especially if it meant they were getting paid for a week to recover. Unfortunately for Haise Sasaki, the morning after he had been released from Cochlea's medical bay was spent with a head splitting migraine; the phantom pain he felt from where he had been shot in the head with a .308 round hit him harder than any sort of hangover would have.
Awakening laying with his back sunken into whatever cheap mattress his employers had purchased for him and his squad, Haise was thankful for the fact that someone had thought to keep his blackout curtains shut tight, as the thought of his bedroom being infiltrated by even a sliver of sunlight made the one-eyed ghoul feel nauseated. 'It was probably Tooru, or even Ginshi; I can't imagine Saiko thinking that far ahead… And as for Kuki… It's sad to say, but he probably would have kept them open if he cared enough to,' Haise mused to himself with a faint chuckle escaping his closed lips, as he dwelled more on his own little "who done it" game that he had created in his head; trying to use his detective skills to deduct who would have been the most likely to be that considerate toward him.
Although the answer would have been straightforward if he were trying to guess to save time, Haise purposely used his imagination to think of outlandish scenarios to help expand his rooster of possible suspects to pick from; a form of bored entertainment that lasted him a whole five minutes, before what limited immersion he had going for him was broken by the sound of a loud snore that nearly jolted him out of bed. 'Who the hell…?' Haise thought to himself while feeling bewildered, as he carefully nursed his forehead with the compression of his soft palm, as he slowly sat up from bed to get a better look at his surroundings.
Laying beside him on the ground was none other that his plus-sized subordinate who had her long-messy blue hair strung about over her short-statured body, as she laid underneath a heavy comforter— keeping warm and cozy, while drooling over the pillow that was apart of the makeshift bedding she was laying on top of. 'Saiko…? You're the one who…? Oh? Ginshi? You too?' Haise thought with a weary smile spreading across his dried lips, as he noticed the tall, slender young man nestled on the brown-cushioned papasan chair that was in the corner of the room— with Saiko in the middle of the both of them.
Trying to moisten his lips with whatever saliva he had left in his dried mouth, Haise felt a warm was growing inside of his chest as he looked over to the otherside of the room to see if one of them had thought to have a bottle of water prepared for him. Upon seeing none other than Mutsuki— his dark-skinned underling, who spent a slightly concerning amount of her time orbiting around him— sleeping directly beside him on the other side of the mattress, Haise couldn't help but to feel a strange mixture of emotions bubbling up inside him; on one hand, he was touched that the young timid woman who he had taken up as his apprentice felt the need to be close to him while he rested, while on the other hand Haise felt as though Mutsuki was beginning to cross a boundary that he wasn't so sure she should be testing.
Nevertheless, Haise still felt happy knowing that at least three-fourths of his squad felt close enough to want to be near him while he had been in his short-term coma. '… I'm really thirsty right now, and I'd hate to wake them up… They all really seem so… Peaceful,' Haise thought fondly of the younger adults around him, as couldn't help but to have the same admiration for all of them that a father would have for his biological children; even Urie, who was, as expected, not in the bedroom with them still had a special place in Haise's healing heart.
Deciding to bear with the excruciating pain he felt radiating deep in his cranium where a quinque-caliber had been lodged into, Haise remained quiet as a church mouse as he carefully shifted toward the end of the bed: nearly stirring Mutsuki awake, after he had gotten up off of the mattress where the shift of weight had elicited a quiet and incoherent grumble from her. Standing frozen in his spot, Haise winced silently with the sound of his heartbeat pounding in his ears from how nearly silent it was in the almost pitch-black bedroom; as not even his blackout curtains could fully mask the sunlight that was seeping through his closed blinds behind them.
'Oh, thank God that didn't wake them up…! Now, just to mosey my way out the door,' Haise thought gladly to himself, before using his experience in covert operations and subterfuge to sneak out of the bedroom, and out through the door that led him into the illuminated hallway. Squinting his eyelids with one hand raised over his face to shield himself from the brightness of the hallway light, Haise was left seeing stars as he let out seethed in pain. 'Goddamn, that's bright…!' The one-eyed ghoul thought to himself, before slowly making his way toward the light, so as to reach the on/off switch that mounted on the white corridor wall; just around where the hallway split off into three separate paths.
By the time Haise had successfully plunged the third-floor hallways into darkness— with only the dim glow of a few plugged-in wall lights and electronics throughout the rest of the corridors to guide his path— he was left seeing stars with his headache pounding. Letting out an exasperated groan as he rubbed the palm down against the front of his face, Haise followed up by letting out a heavy, tired sigh before carrying on down the hallway; eventually making his way to the modern stairwell that led him to the ground floor.
Having adjusted slowly to the interior lights by the time he got down to the kitchen, Haise was still wincing in pulsating pain as he walked slowly like a zombie over to the cupboards above the black-marbel countertops where at; fetching a simple glass cup from the ceiling cabinet, before closing it shut softly. Blowing out a huff of breath from his dried lips, Haise made his way over to the refrigerator to take out the pitcher of cool-purified water, from within the appliance's middle shelf; filling his glass cup with it, before doing the right thing by refilling the plastic pitcher with tap water from the kitchen sink.
Immediately thinking about all the times he had caught everyone— with the exception of Mutsuki— putting the near-empty pitcher of water back into the refrigerator without refilling it, Haise let out a mildly disappointed sigh as he turned around with the cup of cool water in his hands; refreshing his dried mouth, as took a long drink from the rim of the tilted glass. 'These brats think they can get away with everything… Must be this new generation; always so self-entitled, and all that jazz,' Haise thought half-heartedly to himself; still rehydrating himself, while not having the mental capacity to complain further than that.
Once he had gotten enough water to think a little more clearer, and to ward off some of the pain he felt from his headache that was caused by dehydration, Haise carried the glass with him as he made his way over to the new Keurig coffee machine that Mutsuki had bought for him as a gift from his last birthday. Although the coffee it made wasn't quite as delicious as the way he preferred it brewed, the convenience of the Keurig machine was what won Haise over. Popping a "k-cup" into the machine's slot, and using whatever water he had left to pour it into its plastic reservoir, Haise pressed the brew button before placing his Halloween-themed orange mug underneath the metal nozzle of where the coffee would be poured out of.
Gifted with time to kill while the machine was audibly warming up the water— making the same heating sound that an electric pitcher would make— Haise stood with his back toward the counters, as he stared blankly at the bar-styled kitchen island where his squad would make themselves plates of food, before subsequently taking said plates into their rooms to eat alone. 'It's odd to think that I consider those four to be like children to me; taking pride in our family-like synergy that strengthens our bonds together… I wonder if they've forgotten the part of their contract that states that they're to kill me if I ever become hostile to the CCG; as much as it pains me to address it, the only one out of them who I could see even raising a weapon to me would be Kuki…'
'… But even then, he didn't necessarily attack me like the rest of the investigators tried doing when I had that freak out; had it not been for Mado, I'm… I'm not quite sure if even he would have it in him to attack me; God knows I wouldn't want to hurt them, if it came down to it,' Haise thought uncomfortably to himself, as just the mere thought of laying a hand on anyone from his squad made him feel uncomfortable. 'What an awful situation for both parties to be involved with… Makes me wonder why CCG doesn't use their resources to focus more on addressing the issue with ghouls, rather than just hunting them down like monsters… They've got goddamn military-grace naval ships and an overinflated budget that would make the United States blush. Why can't just a fraction of that go into researching possible solutions to prevent ghouls from having to eat human flesh in the first place?'
Although it wasn't the first time that Haise's wandering mind had vented on all of the critiques that he had of the way CCG operated— as doing so in his free time had developed into a past time at that point— it was the first time since Haise had been forced to abandon his old identity did the one-eyed ghoul truly begin to feel strongly about the wrongdoings of his "employers". 'I don't even know why I ask myself these questions; I already know the answer… It's a rigged system that's a product of corruption; if they weren't profiting one way or the other off of harvesting kagunes to create quinque-metal— or more recently, experimenting with creating "quinxes"— then they would've already figured out a way to help ghouls by now,' Haise thought with resentment bubbling inside of his aching mind.
Had it not been for the mocha aroma flooding the kitchen from his freshly brewed mug of coffee, Haise might have continued to dwell more on the injustices done by the organization who he had a lot more resentment towards than he would like to admit. '… Sometimes I feel as though my existence is nothing more than a Kafka novel come to life; I'm thrown into a deep abyss of confusion and despair, where everything seems forever out of my grasp, and I'm but at the mercy of my surroundings… What an awful way to live,' Haise thought to himself, while letting out a quiet exhaled breath through his teeth, as he turned around to pick his spooky mug up by its handle; taking what little joy he could from seeing the black silhouette of Mickey Mouse's iconic head in the shape of a jack-o-lantern on his mug, as smiled while blowing air onto the surface of piping hot liquid; smacking his lips afterward, as for some reason Haise couldn't help but to find the coffee's flavor to be brow raising.
Chalking the distaste off as him still having a dry mouth, Haise shuffled out of the kitchen, and into the living room. Taking his seat on his leather reclining chair, Haise took another sip of coffee before setting down on the wooden side-table that was placed on the left side of the chair itself; allowing him to easily swap his mug for the kindle he kept on the table, all without having to get up after having pulled the wooden lever of the reclining chair. With his legs up and his back lowered down, Haise immediately felt his mind easing down as the feeling of relaxation immediately kicked in for him.
Letting out a yawn while getting teary-eyed afterward, Haise contemplated on whether or not he even had it in him to unlock his kindle's lock-screen— instead choosing to imagine himself reading a book, as his exhausted mind drifting away into thoughts that began to lose their coherency the longer he laid there in his spot. Holding the tablet to his chest like how religious figures were depicted to hold their bibles close to their hearts, Haise's lingering thoughts went from deciding whether or not he was going to read, to recounting the events that shortly led to him getting some of his brains blown out from the otherside of his head.
'… Senpai. I called Orochi "senpai"; that has to be in correlation to Kaneki's life— it's strange to call it that, but at this point I feel so distant from who I used to be, that I might as well be a new person entirely… Oh, yeah; the reason why I called him that— I almost got sidetracked by that,' Haise thought deliriously to himself, as he began hear the sound of own light snoring while his view of ceiling began to make him feel as though the rest of the room from his peripherals was spinning around him.
'Let's see, let's see… The honorific implies that he's my elder in some sort of way; more than likely it ties into a student-peer relation that grew into… Wait… College— I'm certain he and I attended the same college together. Hallway, and moans… Moaning from the hallway; that's… That's… Sounding really familiar,' Haise's drifting mind thought to himself, as the fabrics of what was real and what was part of his mind began to meld together before his flickering eyelids. The stark-white painted ceiling became a canvas for his shattered memories to begin painting themselves onto, as somewhat blurry and almost indecipherable images began playing out like a fever dream before the half-awake man in his reclining chair.
Although his mind couldn't make out the distorted faces of those who weren't the light-brown haired ghoul with glasses that his mind was so adamant about revealing to him, Haise felt a familiar sense of what they were to him; with the most prominent of the reoccurring, blurred-faced individuals being the young man with spiky blond hair with dark-brown roots, and a young waitress who had indigo colored hair that blocked out half of her already indecipherable facial features to Haise. Everything about what he was witnessing felt surreal to Haise, as his mind began showing him important glimpses into his past life; starting from when he walked into the unmasked Orochi getting caught feeling up his girlfriend, and then to the evening of saving the aforementioned human girl that led to the ghoul feeling indebted to Haise; back when he still went by "Ken Kaneki".
By the end of it, Haise's somewhat strung together memories had left off with seeing Orochi explaining to Kaneki how he wouldn't be able to help him with fending off CCG from someone or some organization that Haise couldn't quite place a finger on it at the moment of his delirious state of mind. And although his regenerating brain couldn't mend the memories of who any of the people he saw were as far as names or faces went, the glimpse into his own past life had painted a clear enough picture to show that he and Orochi were once allies— from enemies to practically brothers in arms. And just before Haise was tethering off the cusp of losing consciousness by treading into deep sleep, the one-eyed ghoul was jolted awake by the head-splitting sound of door opening and shutting from the entry hall— just a short walk away from the living room he had nearly fallen asleep in.
'Oh my God; are you kidding me right now?!' Haise thought frustratingly to himself, as he accidentally dropped his thin tablet the moment his hands instinctively went up to nurse his throbbing forehead. "Ugh…! U-Urie?! Urie, is— tch— i-is that you?! Gwuah, ow…!" Haise called out the best he could; needing to pause in between raising his voice, to manage his debilitating headache. Taking in deep breaths to help regulate the agony he was in, it wasn't long until Haise heard the sound of footsteps and loud music being faintly heard coming from what sounded like earbuds growing louder, and louder.
Just as Haise had presumed, none other than his own deputy squad leader had entered the living room with him; the ever present grumpy expression paired with the annoyed look across Urie's face would have made Haise feel the need to apologize to him, had he not been in excruciating discomfort. Blindly reaching down with his hand until his fingers felt the wooden handle attached to his chair, Haise retracted the recliner to have its back raised and its leg rests lowered to where they had been; slowing the one-eyed ghoul to make eye-contact with his second-in-command, without having to strain himself to do so.
Holding a plastic grocery bag in his left, gloved-hand, and one earbud in the other hand, Urie raised a single eyebrow at the way Haise was wincing while struggling to keep his composure while making strained eye-contact with the qunix. "… Aren't you supposed to be in bed resting (or dying)?" Urie asked in his deep, monotone voice; while ensuring to keep the part of how he thought his superior was going to be brain dead after getting a large hole blown through his forehead to himself.
Smiling wearily at the dark-purple haired man, Haise let out a quiet and mildly irritated throaty-chuckle, before focusing on distracting him from his residing migraine enough to speak. "There wasn't any water next to me… So I got up to get some… And then one thing led to another, and here I am," Haise explained quietly with some sass in his voice, as Urie continued to stare back at him with annoyance in his diamond-shaped pupils. "And for the record… I was about to drift off to sleep… Before you busted in here like the damn police…"
"We are the police (dumbass)," Urie replied factually, while harboring some disdain for the mildly sarcastic way Haise sounded. "You should have just woken one of them up, Sasaki: that's part of why they stayed with you, so they could be available to assist with whatever it was that you needed from them… That, and of course… There's "that" other reason as well," Urie added, while lessening his attitude and dropping his shoulders as well.
'Ah… "That" reason, huh? You mean the one that states that I am to be executed by you and your peers, if I ever get out of hand?' Haise thought to himself; mentally addressing the words that Urie— no matter how indifferent he tried to appear before others— had thought as well, but just like the one-eyed ghoul the young qunix couldn't bring himself to say the words aloud.
There was an uncomfortable, drawn out silence between the two, as their once annoyed looks gradually turned into that of empathetic stares. Breaking the ice with an elongated sigh, Urie averted his eyes away from Haise, before pocketing the earbud he had in his right hand. "… I got you these from Dr. Shiba; he said it would help numb the pain, while your gray matter continues to regenerate itself (I still have no idea how or why you're even alive right now, Sasaki)," Urie said, as he reached into the plastic bag he had been carrying with his left— pulling out a translucent, orange pharmaceutical bottle, before walking it over to hand it off to Haise.
Out of habit, Haise decided to put himself in more pain as he strained himself to read whatever top-secret label that the bioengineer who had perfected the surgery to turn humans into artificial one-eyed ghouls. '… Five-hundred milligram pills of Ibuprofen; thirty in total. Huh, I honestly was expecting something more brow-raising than over-the-counter medicine. But I mean, if it works then it works; no need to reinvent the wheel if you don't have to,' Haise thought somewhat bemusedly to himself, before lightly shrugging his shoulders as he popped the white lid off. "Thank you Urie; I appreciate you going out of your way to do this for me," Haise said quietly with a genuinely thankful expression on his face; his heart softening from having previously been disappointed with Urie, as used the glass of water on the table beside him to help swallow two tablets of painkillers.
Although part of Urie was glad to have helped Haise, the squad deputy dared not show even the faintest of smiles within the presence of the twenty-two year old who he was supposed to find too soft to be a squad leader. So instead, the purple-haired man merely gave the one-eyed ghoul a simple nod, before saying "Before I forget: First Class Mado wanted for me to pass along to you that she would like for you to give her a phone call whenever you're up for it; she, apparently, has quite a lot to say to you to justify her mistake," Urie explained with a bit of cynicism in his voice; seemingly harboring some resentment toward the woman who had accidentally gotten her calibers mixed up, before firing the shot that almost took his squad leader's life.
Unlike the rest of his squad— who weren't at all on good terms with the blond-haired woman who had used a scoped rifle to neutralize him during his last mental breakdown— Haise hadn't an ounce of resentment towards Akira Mado in his heart; quite the contrary, as through the moments of lucidity he had while placed in the Cochlea medical bay, the one-eyed ghoul couldn't help but to hope for the blond-haired woman's mental health, as he couldn't have imagined that the guilt she must have been going through was at all as forgiving as he was.
"… Mmhmm; hopefully I'll be able to schedule something sooner than later… Thank you again, Urie; I really do appreciate everything that you do for this team," Haise thanked once again, to which Urie simply replied to him by giving him another nod of acknowledgement, before turning around while placing his earbud back into his left right ear. Watching from the comfort of his recliner as he switched his cup of water out for the Halloween mug of hot coffee, Haise pressed his lips up against its orange ceramic rim while Urie left the living room to presumably go back up to his bedroom.
Left alone with a quarter of a glass left of chilled water, a mug that was mostly full of Konah beaned coffee, and the kindle that he had purchased for all of them to use whenever they wanted, Haise placed his hot beverage down beside his glass cup, before wearily bringing the screen of his tablet up for him to stare down at it, as he lazily held it titled by his abdomen. 'I wonder where Mado and I should go to touch bases with one another… I'm more or less wanting to pick something else aside from just coffee, but considering that my options are kind of limited here, I guess I'll- Wait?! Hold on; this has to be a mistake,' Haise's thoughts quickly spiraled into that of bewilderment; so much so, that even his twice-regrown brain has forgotten about the migraine that had made him practically bed bound.
After having taken his fourth sip of what didn't at all taste like his usual Hawaiian coffee, Haise furrowed his brows while smacking his lips; trying to decipher what the unique yet vaguely similar taste was on the tip of his tongue. Needing to get to the bottom of the mystery that had practically fallen onto his lap, Haise carefully got up from the recliner chair before stumbling his way back into the kitchen. Believing that someone either switched his k-cup with another flavor that he was messing with his mind more than it should've, the only other guess Haise had in mind as he opened up the flip-top latch of the Keurig coffee machine was that he had used an expired k-cup.
Taking the still-warm k-cup out of its slot, Haise felt his heart sink into his chest and his blood run cold the moment his eyes saw what the label on the top of the pod had written on it. '… Hot chocolate… I just drank one of Saiko's hot chocolate k-cups, and I'm… W… What the fuck is going on with me?!'