[IC][Story][Arc 1] House Call

[robkelk]

OOC: Rob's sidestory #2, set between "Time in the Woods" and "It's All Relative"

---

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
October 11, 2016
8:03am

"Rob-san, who else is here?"

Rob looked at Usagi. "There's just the two of us in this room, Usagi-san."

"That isn't what I meant."

"I know. I'm not sure how much I should tell you about other groups. And you have to go catch your bus, or you'll be late for your first day of school here."

"Oh! Leaving now! Bye!"

Rob waited until she was gone, made sure he was alone (confirmed; both Ami and Mii had morning classes), then physically unlocked the case around the computer attached to the line that wasn't connected to the building's LAN and firewall.

---

Online
October 11, 2016
8:17am

ROB_DONALDSON> Is anyone else online?
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Hi there, Rob!
ROB_DONALDSON> What are *you* doing on this board? I thought this was building managers only.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Did you really think you could keep me out?
ROB_DONALDSON> No, I thought you'd be bored here. Does your resident Blackbird fan know you've hacked his account?
WASHUU_HAKUBI> I didn't hack his account.
ROB_DONALDSON> Oh, good.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> I hacked yours, cloned it, and renamed the clone.
ROB_DONALDSON> Shit.
HELPBOT> Language!
ROB_DONALDSON> Sorry.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Aren't you supposed to be taking care of your tenants right now?
ROB_DONALDSON> Just sent them all off to school. Usagi wants to know who else is enjoying the hospitality of the building managers.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> I don't mind if you tell them about us.
ROB_DONALDSON> All of you, or just the Masaki household?
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Good point. Just the Masaki household for now.
ROB_DONALDSON> As long as I've got your attention
WASHUU_HAKUBI> I don't hand out toys to everybody who asks, you know.
ROB_DONALDSON> I know. I also know you'd probably want to run some scans on the Sailor Senshi, and we need a doctor on call.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Sailor Senshi? As in Silver Millennium?
ROB_DONALDSON> The same, or rather their reincarnations.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Give me ten minutes to pack, and I'll be right there.
ROB_DONALDSON> They're on a bus, going to school. And so are the girls from Academy City.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Academy City? Not The Queen, I hope.
ROB_DONALDSON> Ugh. No, not The Queen. Railgun. And her friends from Judgment branch 177. How do you know about them?
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Skuld suggested I read the novels.
ROB_DONALDSON> Skuld? *The* Skuld?
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Belldandy's sister, yeah.
.
WASHUU_HAKUBI> Hey, are you still there?
ROB_DONALDSON> Is she the sysop here?
WASHUU_HAKUBI> I think so, yeah.
ROB_DONALDSON> I've talked with Skuld-sama...
WASHUU_HAKUBI> "Sama"? Okay, I'm coming over in five minutes. You need to talk to somebody face-to-face before you get lost in that sensawunder you're feeling.

---

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
October 11, 2016
8:44am

"This is decent tea."

Rob smiled. "Thanks. I expect it isn't as good as what Sasami-chan makes, but I do have a good source of supply."

"You're right on both counts," Washuu replied. "Nice place you've got here. Cozy."

"'Cosy' is right. We could use... no. I'm not going to ask you for things."

"Okay, what were you thinking of?"

"Well... Two things: A bath large enough for everybody to soak in, and some place where Mikoto and Makoto can spar. But we don't have room for either of those."

"Not even in a pocket dimension?"

Rob chuckled. "We'd need one of those for them, yes. But I'm not going to ask you for things."

"No, you'll just be apologetically passive-aggressive about mentioning them."

"Which is why I didn't want to say anything. But I mentioned Mikoto and Makoto. They want to match their abilities against each other, and I'm afraid that one or both of them'll get hurt, and the doctors here won't know how to heal them."

"I don't mind being your on-call doctor until Ami graduates. How long will that take?"

Rob thought for a moment. "Pre-med, then medical school, then residency, then certification - a normal student would take seven years, maybe six. Ami-chan ... maybe five-and-a-half."

"She'll take at least six, if she knows what's good for her. It would be bad if she was to burn out before she started her practice."

"That it would - but she's insecure enough to push herself too hard to succeed."

Washuu nodded once. "The anime portrayal was that accurate, was it?"

"I'm afraid so. Do you have any ideas on how to get her to slow down?"

"I can give you a book full of them." She moved her hands into a typing position, typed on the virtual keyboard that appeared in front of her, and held up one hand to take the book out of the dimensional portal that opened behind her shoulder. "Here it is."

Rob grinned. "Okay, that kind of help I have no problem asking for. You mentioned that you've read the books that my other tenants came from. Do you have anything that Saten Ruiko could study to strengthen her esper ability to the point where she can actually use it?"

"I'll need to scan her first to be sure, but I think this would do the trick." Washuu tapped one key, then grabbed the two books that came out of the portal. "If you didn't ask, I would have offered it anyway. The other book is for Uriharu Kazari." She put both books on the table. "But should we give it to her?"

"why not? The worst that can happen is that she won't read it."

"No, the worst that can happen is that she reads it cover-to-cover, carries out all the exercises regularly, becomes what she calls a Level 5, and decides to take over the universe."

Rob's eyebrows headed for his hairline. "She's that powerful? Potentially?"

"Right now, she has partial control over thermodynamics. But, just like Mikoto started as just an electrokinetic and gained control over all aspects of electromagnetism, controlling thermodynamics is the first step toward controlling entropy altogether. And let's be honest - there's a reason why Mikoto is called 'the only sane Level 5'."

"I see your point. More tea?"

"Please."

After a moment, Washuu sighed with contentment. "Sasami-chan has let me know just what a good cup of tea does for a person, and a decent cup of tea has the same effect."

"Should I be flattered?"

"No, anyone can make a decent cup of tea from good-quality leaves."

"Gee, thanks."

"You're welcome. Now, I want to make sure my sensors are calibrated properly. Sit down and get ready for your physical. Doctor's orders."

---

9:31am

Washuu tapped a few keys on her terminal, took the face-shaped probe off of Rob's head, and carefully put the probe back in its dimensional pocket. Then she turned her attention to the terminal's display. "Oh. I think you'd better see this."

Rob walked over to behind Washuu. "I suspect I know what you're worried about, Washuu-chan ..." He looked at what she was pointing out on the screen, and sighed. "...Yeah, I expected as much."

"Someone else in your family has it?"

"Someone else in my immediate family had it."

"Oh. I'm sorry." After a moment, Washuu continued, "Would you like a treatment?"

"GOD, yes!"

"I can't cure it, but I can mitigate it by rebuilding your nervous system. We may as well fix those two imperfectly-healed joints while we're at it. Then there's your weight, your vision -"

"I've had poor vision almost all my life. I wouldn't know what to do without my glasses."

"Okay, we'll leave your vision alone. Want any powers while we're at it?"

"No. If you can't help Rui-chan, I'm not going to leave her as the only unpowered person living in the building. And before you ask, as tempting as it might be to be closer to the girls' apparent age, I don't want to look any younger, either."

"What about an overall boost to your stamina, resiliency, and rate of healing?"

Rob smiled. "Did your landlord tell you about a fictional character named 'Garrick Grimm'?"

"That's exactly the package that I'm offering you here. And it was his idea - but you're going to be my guinea pig for the treatment."

"All right. How long will it take?"

"For my computers to program the nanobots? About as long as it'll take me to make a pocket dimension with an extra-large furo in it."

"I said I didn't want -"

"You'll need it, to soak in while the nanotech does its work. Listen to your doctor."

---

3:22pm

"And that's the last of the injections."

Rob smiled thinly. "Oh, good. I'm glad there's a stamina boost in there - I'm exhausted."

"It'll get worse before it gets better. You said something about not wanting to look younger, even before I had a chance to ask."

"Yeah." Rob sighed. "Doctor-patient confidentiality?"

"If it doesn't hurt anyone else."

"That's fair. In this universe, the Sailor Moon anime came out nearly a quarter-century ago. I was a little over half my current age back then."

"Which one did you have a crush on?"

"Two, actually. Back then, I thought 'if only they were a decade older, and interested in somebody like me, and spoke English, and most importantly weren't fictional'... and now here they are, speaking English and not fictional and at least polite toward me. It wouldn't be fair to them or the others for me to try to make a youthful fantasy a reality."

"Skuld says we're not staying here forever."

"But now that you're here, you can make permanent pathways between our various worlds when it's time for you to leave, right?"

"Of course I can, buster!" Washuu thought for a quick moment. "And that's why you're not making that fantasy a reality."

"Yeah. They have lives of their own back in their own reality."

"That they do. And you still haven't told me which two you have a crush on."

"Yes, I have. You're smarter than the rest of us put together; I'm sure you've already figured it out."

Washuu glanced at the book still sitting on the table, and the "sparring room" plans sitting beside the book. "Getting you to say it out loud would be nice, but now I understand why you're willing to ask for favours for them." Then she smiled. "If you were a Juraian noble, you could marry both of them and a couple more, too."

"I'm not a Juraian noble, and even if I was, it's up to them who they marry." Rob yawned.

"And I've distracted you long enough from the changes starting in your body for you to not freak out over them starting, and learned more about you than you might have wanted to share. I am such a genius!"

"You and Wile E. Coyote, when you say it that way."

"Who?"

Rob shook his head. "You're going to have to research that one yourself."

"Coward."

"Yep."

---

5:05pm

The girls, less Mii and Ami, were all watching the fun instead of doing their homework. (Rob was taking a nice, long soak in the new bath.)

"This has to be the stupidest medical exam I've ever had!"

"Now, now, Shirai-san - don't annoy the only person on this planet who's competent enough to be your doctor." Washuu grinned evilly. "Unless you don't want a doctor."

Kuroko paled at that thought. "No, of course not. Please continue."

Meanwhile, Ruiko, Usagi, and Minako were trying their best to keep straight faces - and failing miserably - while Washuu's probe made the same faces that Kuroko did. Washuu looked over at them and pointed at Usagi. "You're next."