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text | un: rico.dredd

I've got some big news, everyone. Could be the start of things happening directly to us instead of around us, so there's one point for experiment. Or drokking entertainment. I woke up handcuffed. Standard issue, nothing special. On all levels they shouldn't be, but I've tried everything. And they are not. coming. off. I know nobody came in while I was sleeping. And unlocking them isn't about skill, don't waste your time implying that it is. I’d like to know if somebody could find it in their gorgeous generous neighborly heart to bring a hacksaw. I’ll even take a sledgehammer and a spike if you have a VERY delicate touch and someone to vouch you’re not a serial killer Your good-looking neighbor in need, Rico Dredd

[ooc: Surprise, surprise - Rico's landed himself some mild city-provided timeout time. He is kind of starting to lose his shit. Plenty of characters are welcome to try breaking them, it’s going to be a very long 24 hours for him. Bring on your brain, magic powers, bullshit, smart comments, etc.

Rico's permissions/warnings are here. cw: hand injuries are involved bc he is insane. Also, I would greatly encourage threadhopping in this network post!]

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[The idea does give Rico some pause. But not enough. No speed-heal machines here. If there’s an hospital around here they don’t have access to yet, there’s no one to figure out how the more complicated medical equipment works anyway. No vat-grown replacements, no cybernetics… An old-school recovery, all the way.

Oh well. You’ve got to spend money to make money.]

I’ll risk it. [Cavalier, dismissive. One might say - who needs to look before you leap?] The thing comes off in a day. And besides - [Rico wiggles a finger underneath the cold metal cuff, demonstrating the slight space it leaves him.] Couldn’t get my hand through, but it didn’t stay any smaller when I stopped trying. If it really doesn’t work, I’ll back out and figure something else out.

[For an Dredd, it really is as simple as that. And enjoy the four weeks of recovery time, I guess.]

（ well, it's not any more insane than urahara severing his soul chain.

and he kinda gets the feeling that if he says no, dredd will just do it himself. and quite possibly get more fucked up, on account of it.

(why are so many of his male acquaintances made on the heels of doing grievous bodily harm to one-another? maybe she's born with it, maybe it's shō(nen)belline.)

so he sighs as he sits back down, already halfly resigned to the lunatic plan. but he's not really any more convinced it'll work — or maybe whoever slapped him in cuffs is convinced no one would go that far? hard to say. hell, maybe he'll wind up in cuffs for the act of causing bodily harm to someone else. seems like the city's got some weird-ass rules he can't say he cares to follow at the best of times. ）

Fine. But take some of the nerve blockers first and let them kick in. I already worked out you're tough — you don't need to prove it.

[Grievous bodily harm is probably just a male bonding thing, honestly.

And yes, Ichigo would be right. He would've bashed his hand against the very convenient, very immobile edge of the marble counter right there. Rico rolls his eyes, and gropes at the table for a marker pen, lying between several bottles. Uncaps it with a loud pop, and while he's scrawling a messy purple ink target on his left hand - ]

Try to get it right the first time. We're trying to get a clean break here, not play whack-a-mole.

[The only thing worse than having a bone broken is having a bone broken in several places. There's a word of wisdom for you. Rico flips the pen around in his hand. Taps the other bottle Kurosaki brought with the end of it, and the clear liquid inside wibbles invitingly. Must be the nerve blockers. That looks heavy duty.]

Alright, nurse. You know where to stick it?

More or less.

（ his dad would literally murder him if he happened to show up now, hollering about doing this shit without the proper training. straight up dropkick him through a wall. ichigo's never exactly had a yen for healing the same way as his old man. but he's watched him do more than a few injections for carpal tunnel sufferers.

but he takes a breath, and tries to visualize the anatomy involved.

if inoue were here, they could just cut the damn hand off and have her fix it. it'd be the easier (and frankly, probably less worrisome) procedure. he's got a lot more experience lopping off limbs than doing impromptu medical procedures.

after a moment's consideration, he lifts one shoulder in a shrug. ）

Median nerve. Give me your hand.

（ he rummages through the bag, coming up with a syringe still in its pack. he rips it open, pulls it out of the sterile packaging, scans the pamphlet on the nerve blocker itself. all he needs is the dosage per kilo. rico's probably got twenty on him, so that's an easy calculation to make, and then he draws the plunger back to fill it, needle jabbed through the little rubber filter at the bottle's top. ）

Don't — squirm or anything.

（ but there's not exactly any hesitation to his doing it. once he identifies the proper spot, it'll be done and dusted asap so long as rico doesn't have any strenuous objections. ）

[More or less is good enough. Rico gives him his hand. Lays his arm out, palm up and fingers curled loosely. Doesn’t tense up when the syringe approaches, watches the needle push in past his skin with the bored look of someone who’s entirely too used to having this particular medical procedure performed on him. A little pinch, and - there it goes. All in.

If Kurosaki really wanted to screw with him, this would be a good opportunity. He could withdraw just a bit more of that liquid than he should, and Rico would never know.]

It’d take more to make me squirm. [He can feel it working as he twitches his swollen thumb, the warmth working its way down. Or - not feel it, to be technical.] So what have you done since our last chat? Get up to anything fun?

Edited 2023-07-27 01:45 (UTC)

（ he snorts as he leans back, capping the needle out of inherited habit and setting it aside. well, the fact he didn't immediately yelp and haul away is probably a good sign he did it properly. but ichigo's watching him just the same. just in case. not that he really knows what he'd do if he just caused a medical crisis, but. you know. something. ）

You seriously don't have to make small talk, Dredd.

（ look, ichigo's pretty self-aware. he doesn't think anyone's looking for an answer to that question that boils down to wallowing in depression. he knows, too, that it's a weakness and a habit of his — succumbing to that backslide that feels almost inevitable and has, historically, required one of his friends to (literally) kick him out of it.

he's fine with not having much purpose or direction, as long as he has people around him. in lieu of that, he needs something to strive for. but in an immutable city where all the power at his fingertips amounts to nothing and he doesn't know anyone? yeah. let's just say he's not at his best.

but it's no one else's problem but his, which is why he gets up out of the chair and sidesteps around the counter to put an extra bottle of the asked-for juice and the rest of the onigiri away in the fridge. ）

For the record, though, I'm pretty sure I can't do a liver transplant.

（ like,,,, sir, are you a dragon of all things dionysian? ）

[A smirk quirks up the corner of his mouth. Small talk, guilty as charged. Thought he'd call it gathering information. He is genuinely curious as to what the juve is doing, how he's handling the circumstances. Not everyone's a former judge, after all. And he's never met a cit who impressed him with their backbone or intelligence. Still, the people here are... different. As evidenced.]

Don't have to, [Rico agrees mildly, flexing his hand.] But I was just curious.

[Nothing to do but wait for it to finish kicking in. If it hasn't been made clear by now, he's always up to something. Sitting still and getting bored isn't for him. And you've only got so many hours in the day when you've got to sleep for at least five of them to function. No rest for the wicked, or something like that. And just because of that remark about liver transplants that he's going to politely ignore -]

I'm sure you've got a lot of worries locked away. [Just like his powers. What else is in there?] Isn't there someone at home who's missing you? Like your daddy doctor?

（ said with a snort as he closes the fridge — ）

Ah, my old man's pretty casual about the whole parenting thing.

（ he has never doubted his father loves him, not once — but the guy's way of expressing love was more kick to the head than home-cooked meal. by now, isshin has to know he's gone — but whether or not that's translated into missing him is hard to say.

he leans against the countertop, arms folded. ）

I've got kid sisters, though. They'll worry.

（ in wildly different ways. yuzu will stress-bake and karin will go beat up jerks at the soccer fields or something, and that'll be that. ）

There's casual, and there's casual, Ichigo. [he drawls heavily, with an only slightly mocking attitude of 'really?'.] You've been missing for weeks without a word. Your sisters are, but he's not worried you've been kidnapped for your 'talent', or chopped up into itty bitty pieces by some psycho and buried in a pit?

[Unless he has a habit of taking off without a word on a regular basis. For all Rico knows, maybe he does. Psi-talent must make things complicated. He must be a daddy's boy. That's judging by the way he accepts his father being "casual" about parenting easily - sounds more like a way to excuse his father than an easy, breezy 'no big deal' - and how he ran here to play nursemaid, and blew his carrot-top on the network about the sanctity of the medical profession or whatever. Rico lifts one shoulder in a shrug. Joking, wry. Entirely constructed.]

Absent fathers, right? Sorry to hear that, buddy. [And as if throwing him a bone;] Guess he thinks you can handle yourself.

[ Maybe not physically absent if he helps out at the clinic and has clearly picked up a few things, but maybe in other ways. The smile he gives is supposed to be sympathetic, commiserating - but the one that actually comes out is as bitter as used caf grounds, underlaid with sourness and the glimpse of a foundation driven into something deeper. Not envy, never envy. Who needs family, anyway? Who needs siblings that worry? All they did was betray you. Never understand you either, but worst of all - never even try to.

Also, who's projecting on the motives and attitudes of father figures? Not Rico, surely.]

（ it's funny, how sometimes people give things away without meaning to. there's a long moment where he just looks at the guy, reaching up idly to scratch at his cheek — and then ichigo makes a sort of tche sound as he pushes himself away from the counter and comes back over to where rico's got his hand laid out on the countertop like a science project. ）

It's not what you think, （ he says finally. it's contemplative more than defensive. like he's trying to work out for himself how much he's going to give away.

rico's the first person that's seen him use his powers. but that doesn't mean that he wants the guy to have a free peep show into his entire life, either. ） and I didn't say he wouldn't worry. I'm sure he will. But he's not going to put his life on hold for it.

（ the clinic was closed exactly one day after his mom died, before isshin flung the doors back open and ushered one and sundry inside. ichigo remembers that people had put flowers on the front step, and how his father had taken all of them and put them in vases around the clinic, strange bright spots amidst the maelstrom of howling grief he felt. yet, he never really saw his father raise his voice, or cry, or do any of the usual things that followed loss. at the time, it was like having a foot in two worlds. one world where his father seemed and acted normal and it was like nothing had ever changed, and the other, in which his mother's absence could have sucked all the oxygen out of a room, and he lost hours staring at the fast-moving water at the river's edge, wondering if the monster would come back for him.

(and it did. but that's a story for another day.) ）

He's got people to look after, and he'll put his focus there. My sisters are just kids. （ said in the tone of one who surely does not lump himself in that selfsame category. ） You're right, though, that he knows I can look after myself.

[It’s not what you think. Yeah, well, in Rico’s humble opinion, when you start busting those particular words out - it usually is. That his father wouldn’t put his life on hold until Kurosaki was found is a black mark against him. Rico would have done anything for his brother, once. Moved the earth to find him. Shared his lunch. Broken into an evidence room and tweaked the mechanisms of a lawgiver ever-so-slightly to indicate mechanical fault. Anything from the little to the large.

Things are different now, of course. Or - they have been for a while. But that’s not the point.

Kurosaki seems to think that his father won’t even get off his ass. Worry is nothing without action. Still, Ichigo seems… ]

True. You can handle yourself and he knows it. [Rico shrugs. He’s sure a well-applied cero takes care of a great number of problems.] What good son would want anything else?

[Who would ask for anything else, for more than what he’s given?]

（ he snorts, but it's half a laugh.

what good son indeed?

ichigo shakes his head, dragging a hand through his shaggy mop of radioactive orange hair, and then: ）

Anyway. How's the hand feeling now?

[How is his hand feeling now?

He presses his palm flat against the counter - nothing. Can't feel the cold leeching the heat from his skin. Knock on wood, all goes well. Better check again. This time it's a more literal, rather clumsy knock on very expensive-looking marble countertop. A twinge, and Rico grunts, but -]

Good enough.

[His hand goes flip-flop to demonstrate, as he talks.]

Alright, Ichigo-buddy. You ready to inflict some grievous bodily harm and show this cuff who's boss?

（ in a tone that has only the faintest echo of one steeling themselves for some unpleasant task — ）

Sure.

（ not like it's anywhere near the most grievous injury he's ever inflicted on someone who is a maybe-friend, or something. ）

I'm not going to use the hammer, though. I can be more precise with my hands.

（ #OPshōnenfuckery. ）

[Rico raises an eyebrow, not sure whether to take it as a joke or not. But he reaches out his hand anyway, because it probably isn’t.

Well now, he thinks, with a calculating look in his eyes. That could - he could be useful. Because you don’t see strength like that in psis. Or ever. Prosthetics and robots, maybe. But he doubts Kurosaki’s made of servos and steel. It’s a little early in his time for that kind of tech, isn’t it? He’s gotta run out of secrets to tell sometime. How many more tricks is he gonna pull out of his hat?

The answer is too many because Rico has literally no idea about the laws of shounen fuckery.]

Sure.

[Rico echoes, with no hint of seriousness in his voice. A faint smile on his face, and he forces his hand to uncurl. And impatiently;]

Well? Have at it.

（ has anyone ever told you that you should be less trusting, rico?

(given the traps he navigated around to get here, probably not, but hey —)

ichigo takes his hand, cradling it between two of his. there's not much delicacy to the touch, and his hands are rough and calloused in a way that suggests frequent and exhaustive weapons handling. that messy purple x marks the spot scrawl is positioned under one thumb, and then — ）

Count back from three.

（ — spoilers, he's not going to wait for three. little medical trick. he'll be going on two, the quick pop and snap of pressure. sure, he's not as strong as he's used to — but when your default is possessing the capability of stopping a blade swung with the force that could cut a mountain in half, it's really not that hard to break human bones, either. ）

[It's obvious that Kurosaki isn’t going to go on time - he knows that whole song and dance, he's been through that enough - that he’s already tense when Ichigo makes his move and snaps his hand like a candy cane in half, with a wet, crunching sound.

Rico lets out a choked-off noise that stops just as abruptly. It’s like the opposite of watching a vid with the sound off. The noise disconnected from the view, muffled through a dozen layers of synthi-cotton. Bodily injury being an intimate friend of his, he knows what a broken bone should feel like. Just one of the hazards of living in the line of duty - and as a prisoner on Titan with too many kinds of “accidents” that could happen to a bent Judge. But his heartrate picks up as his brain recognizes the way it looks wrong, knows that it's bad. Blood pounding in his head, he takes a moment to collect himself and eyes the cuffs dangling from his wrists with resentment.]

Alright, you little freak of nature, [Rico mutters darkly under his breath. Directed at the handcuffs, obviously.] Let’s see you deal with me now.

[A little less confidently-collected, a little more frazzled, Rico wraps his right hand around the other in an iron grip and gets to work forcing his hand through. His hand squeezes through, he's out. It's a matter of physics. Simple. Easy.

...It is not being simple, or easy. In fact, it's just oddly not getting through, no matter how much he forces his hand in on itself. Then he reaches the point at which he should be free already and he's made no progress. The cuffs are moving the drokking finish line on him! Realizing this, Rico redoubles his efforts with a snarl.]

（ he steps back once the deed is done, knowing all too well just what it means to have one's space when you're in pain — but he pays keen mind to the cuffs, and when rico struggles to extricate himself despite all best efforts, despite the fact that it should work...

he lifts a hand to where the soul chain had once been anchored against his chest, and his fingers work into the fabric of his shirt in a sort of sympathetic grimace, flexing once before he drops it away.

he'd known the cuffs weren't normal when a cero couldn't damage it, but this adds another, complicated layer to what's already pretty fucked up.

shit, this guy — he reaches out and clamps a hand around the man's uninjured wrist. ）

Dredd. Stop — it's not going to work.

[Feeling deft fingers close around his wrist he jerks back on instinct. It's an immediate, well-trained reflex for him to move; pull the other person off-balance, shoulders straining to throw them to the floor, his body compensating for the cuffs instinctively. Five foot eleven, hundred sixty to a hundred seventy pounds, overreaching - but the grip doesn't falter even the slightest and Rico almost loses his footing on the polished floor before bracing his stance again. This is a thousand times worse than the cuffs. Rico turns on Ichigo like he'd forgotten he was even there - which he practically almost did.]

Kurosaki.

[He grinds out, between his teeth. A voice strung taut with tension, a short glimpse of a warning of the explosive consequences tied to it. Like a momentary shine on a metal wire at ankle height. Ichigo could snap his wrist as easily as breathing. He probably wouldn't, but who's to say Rico wouldn't be wrong again? He already made one miscalculation today when he hadn't taken Ichigo for anything but an ordinary juve and invited him right into his safehouse.

Still, that doesn't seem to phase Rico at all in the way he issues his demand in a low growl of a voice.]

Let. Go.

（ two roads diverged in a yellow wood.

with the people in his world, he knows what he'd do. he'd wrestle renji to the floor, probably punch zaraki right in the face (only way he'd ever listen) or squabble with ishida until they've both forgotten what initially set them off. rukia he'd just throw easily over one shoulder, her size working against her all too much. chad wouldn't have fought him in the first place. inoue — no, he's not going to think about her, how her panic would set in under his skin like flaying blades, like —

(he can't do this. not right now. focus, kurosaki. )

but the truth is, he doesn't know dredd all that well. relationships are a matter of boundaries. how much, how far, how fast you can push. and ichigo, for all that he can be a delinquent prick in a lot of ways, isn't fundamentally a jackass.

so he lets him go, hand splaying open without protest. ）

Sorry. （ he says, and means it. he knows blind animal panic when he sees it, even if it's shaped like human fury. ） But you need to stop fighting, or you're gonna do a shitload of lasting damage. Let's get some ice for the break to keep the swelling down.

[In that split-second between demand and apology, Rico is very clearly sizing up his options on how to fight somebody strong enough to snap bones with ease and vaporize anything at his fingertips, and it shows. No matter how ordinary he is, he’s still a Dredd. He’s horrifically, hilariously outclassed in that department, but it doesn’t even cross his mind to not try.

But it doesn’t turn out to be necessary. He pulls away as soon as Ichigo deigns to let go. Standing there with his jaw clenching and unclenching, the muscle twitching in his cheek. It’s evident how much Dredd doesn’t "appreciate” being confined. Nor does he like being wrong.

But between the reasonable tone and ensuing logic, Ichigo backing down and the reminder of lasting damage, he seems to start composing himself.

Seems, anyway.]

Okay. You’ve got a point.

[Rico smiles thinly, pleasantly. But his eyes dart around until they land on the freezer on the other side, still thinking.]

Ice is in the freezer. Go get it?

[It’s about a dozen steps away. It’s a big apartment. You’re not going to make him get it, are you?]

Yeah, yeah.

（ where else would you store ice, you weirdo? it's enough of an offputting statement that his jaw shifts to one side, briefly thoughtful. his attention drops to the man's hand, the ugly purple bruise spidering out from beneath the like-hued marker. he's not sorry for doing it, but he's sorry for the world of hurt it's going to be as soon as those nerve blockers wear off, so — he turns on one heel and heads for the fridge.

there's a faint bit of tension to his shoulders, barely visible save to the trained eye — because he knows that he's probably at some amount of risk of rico just bashing him over the head in his that residual, retaliatory panic. ultimately, though, he doesn't actually care. better to show trust, and let people show you who they really are, than let yourself be consumed by suspicion. ）

You want another bottle of that lemonade shit?

（ shock can dehydrate you pretty quick, after all. ）

[Don’t be ridiculous. Rico wouldn’t bash him over the head in a panic. He’d use his heavy boot to kick in the back of his knee and fold him like an omelette, drop him to the floor, and then stomp him. Economy of effort. That, or a spin kick if he felt like being fun.

Either way, that's not a real concern. Rico picks up on the slight tension in Ichigo's frame, secretly pleased. That means he's something to be worried about, could still be some kind of actual threat if he needed to be. He watches the juve's back as he picks through the fridge. Twenty three feet away.

Now, he wonders... His new buddy Ichigo's strong, but is he fast, too? There's one way to force another trick out of his bag. And if he's not that fast, Rico still gets to do what he needs to do without interference. Like hell it's not going to work. Lasting damage is the last thing on his mind right now.]

Yeah.

[Rico shifts. He lifts his hands above his head, and the clink of the chain is going to the the only warning Ichigo gets before he tries to bring his broken hand down hard on the uncompromising marble counter edge with exact, pinpoint precision and no hesitation.]

（ why ）

（ w h y ）

text | un: rico.dredd

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cw: medical/needle chatter

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rico about to mcfreaking lose it

been there, buddy

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1/?

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okay i think i'm done

lmfaooooo

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