Hello there, this is my first time with an OC, because honestly I don't like OC's... buuuut this being a Kanda fic, it almost required an OC as there really is no one good to pair him with in the DGM universe. I am quite adverse to the Allen pairing because it's crack and batshit crazy. Anyway, if you do choose to read this (please do, I like to believe it's good ;D) let me know what you think, this chapter really is just the introduction to the OC. Thanks for checking this out and giving it a try.
It had been a year and a half since she last stepped foot in Headquarters and the place was just as she had remembered it. Dark, gloomy yet somehow warm and inviting, eerily quiet yet strangely chaotic at the same time, the whole place just seemed like a huge juxtaposition. It always amused her whenever she came by, there always seemed to be mysteries to unveil here, and unlike the dark secrets of the Asian Branch she grew up at, the adventures here always seemed so much more light hearted. Yet despite all the fun and games, puzzles and solutions, there was always that one mystery she was never able to unravel. The one which started it all, so very long ago, in a place so very far away, yet it always seemed to follow her, taunt her, and emerge every now and then, throwing her into a constant state of unrest. It was the the one thing she needed answers for, and if she could just find him, then everything, all those heinous secrets she had unearthed surrounding this place could be forgiven.
A long time ago, or it seemed like a long time ago, though when you are sixteen, ten years is a long time, she spent a considerable amount of time at the Asia branch. It was there where she learned almost everything she knows now, and it was there where she encountered the one thing, or rather person, that would gnaw at her soul for seven long years. The funny thing about that whole situation for her was the fact that no one seems to remember seeing that boy, it was as if she had made the whole thing up, yet something deep inside her told her that it was not so. No, it happened, or at least she still believes it happened, otherwise why would he still haunt her dreams? Seven years is a long time to hold onto something, although she learned within the first few weeks to stop asking about him, she never stopped searching. It was that search that spurred her discovery of those dark hidden secrets, of those long forgotten rooms and bloody walls.
Although the Asia branch was a vast place, a deep cavern woven into the earth, full of lost staircases and forgotten turns, she explored every path, every tunnel. Whenever she found herself lost within those twisted hallways and unfamiliar nooks, something inside her always seemed to guide her out. Oh the atrocities she uncovered in that godforsaken place she once called home. That was the thing that always bothered her about the Black Order, they were supposed to be on God's side, on the right side, the light side, but to her the very name of the Order exposed it true core; black. It used to infuriate her, the darkness she discovered behind those tightly sealed doors, but now she believes she is finally starting to see the light, or at the very least the different shades of gray.
Her father would always tell her that not everything was black or white, not people, nor events, and especially not something as massive as the Black Order. There were simply too many moving parts, too many different ambitions and personalities, and that humans always found a way to pervert the purest of intentions. He had once told her that the one thing she had to remember when dealing with the Order was that no one could be trusted, and that she should always stay true to the mission and always mind the war. The mission; innocence. What a joke. If innocence was supposed to be God's will, the one thing that can save mankind from the Earl of the Millennium and his army of Akuma, then why in God's name did it prompt people to do such despicable things? It is no wonder there is a war raging around them, humans doing deplorable things just to advance their own selfish desires.
She sighed, thinking about these things always put a damper on her mood, she needed to think of bright, happy things, like black sesame mochi or green tea ice cream. For a moment she considered taking a detour to the cafeteria prior to checking in, but the thought quickly passed, and she turned off toward the Branch Head's office. The sooner she checked in the sooner she could start her experiment, or rather build her contraption, the sooner she could be done with it. If the stupid thing did not take so long to incubate she would hold off until morning, but alas no, a ten day incubation was a must for the cells to fuse properly and she was not looking forward to staying that long.
A younger version of herself would have been delighted and found some new room to discover or some new mystery to unravel, but the current Renge did not desire such things. The magic had been lost over the years, although the incessant nagging to continue her quest to find that boy, that mirage who dissipated as soon as she saw it, continued to plague her mind. It was weird, she had not actively thought about him for years, but for some inexplicable reason, the moment she stepped off the boat that afternoon, she could not shake the urge to find him again. The whole notion of finding this mystery boy seemed slightly preposterous to her now, true, his very being consumed her soul, but she only really saw him once. Once, seven years ago, god knows what he looks like now, or even how he looked like then, she had only really caught a glimpse, while behind a wall, fifty yards away. The boy who haunted her dreams was just a blur, but those feelings, that insatiable desire to touch him, to know him, gnawed at her core, convincing her he was real.
Shaking these though she tried to focus on the task at hand, report in, start incubation, stuff face with mochi, soak in bath, sleep. Seemed like a good enough plan, simple, straight forward, but to her dismay, when she opened the door to Branch Head Komui Lee's office, she was greeted by the usual mass of paper, but Komui was nowhere in sight. It was aggravating, she hated it when things did not go as planned, granted she had just made up this plan moments ago, but it was still aggravating. Tossing her bag onto the couch in front of his desk she took a seat and waited, toying with the idea of heading over to the science divison first, but it was hard to say how long Komui would be, and she would much rather get the dreaded task of reporting in over with.
Suddenly the office doors swung open and she was glad she had decided to wait. "Renge-chan! You're here!" The Branch Head exclaimed entering with flair. He seemed excited, too excited, and that meant he probably came up with another quote brilliant contraptions, and that was never a good thing. Although, his current mood might be beneficial to her since hopefully due to his state of excitement, her report might go smoothly. "Where's General Cross, he didn't come with you again?" He asked looking all around her as if the General was hiding behind her or something.
With that her hopes was dispelled and she frowned slightly, perhaps things will not go as smoothly as she desired. "Oh you know he hates this place." She said casually, attempting to draw the attention away from his absence.
"Oh well that's unfortunate. There were things I had wanted to discuss with him." The tall Chinese man said, moving behind his desk while he proceed to mindlessly arrange a stack of papers on his overflowing desk.
Of course there were things that needed to be discussed, like why they had not checked in for the past year and a half, or even what the heck they had been up to this whole time. But these things were sensitive, and she for one could not trust the Order in the least bit, not even Branch Head Komui, the most ethical person there. "Um, well he did want me to report that he is making progress with the mission and that things are going as well as they could be." She realized how much of nothing just came out of her mouth, but there was nothing she could really do about it except hope it would be enough.
The Branch Head took a long sip of coffee out of his bunny mug, and waited for the young exorcist to continue. Unfortunately, she just sat there, with her hands on her lap fidgeting slightly with the edge of her dress, it was clear she had said all she needed to say, which obviously was not much. He understood that the nature of the mission was delicate, but honestly he was expecting just a little bit more.
Glancing up at him she realized that although he was not urging her to continue, he was giving her a look that said he would appreciate some more information, information she was not willing to divulge. Then she remembered the innocence shards, those two little shards they had found could be her ticket out of this awkward conversation. Quickly, she reached into her pocket and presented them to Komui. "Here, we also found these two shards since the last time I checked in… you should probably get these over to Hevlaska as soon as possible."
Putting down his mug, Komui retrieved the shards from the girl and smiled knowingly. "So how long will you be staying with us this time?" It did not bother him that the girl was trying to deflect the details concerning General Cross' activities, quite frankly he did not really care. He was sure that the General had his reasons for staying hidden, Komui knew that this place was shrouded in darkness, and although he did his best to shed some light for the sake of his sister, he understood that words could be misinterpreted, actions misconstrued, and that somethings were just better left alone.
Renge let out a subtle sigh of relief, she was glad that he was not going to push the subject. "About two weeks, there's something I need to get done in the science division, which unfortunately takes about ten days to fuse."
"Unfortunately? I would have thought that you would welcome the break. It's not every day you get an opportunity to sit back and relax for two weeks." He said. Traveling around the world non stop would be tiring for any normal person, but traveling non stop around the world with General Cross, that was a whole other beast.
Relax huh, she supposed it would be nice to be able kick back and do nothing for a bit, to not have to constantly pick up and find a new place to stay, worry about Akuma or innocence, but the idea was rather foreign to her. She had never been one to idly sit about, she always needed some sort of adventure, be it a new secret to uncover or an Akuma to destroy, and on those rare days where the Akuma was sparse and all the mysteries solved, she would simply train. Though there was nothing simple about her training regiment, for it was For, the guardian deity of the Asian Branch who taught her everything she knew, and For, did not go easy on her. "I think I can try that." She said as she stood up to take her leave. She was glad that things went smoothly with Komui, that the Branch Head understood her distrust of the Order and why some things were better left to the unknown. The Order did not need to know what General Cross was up to, they did not need to know how deep they were infiltrating, not until the time was right.
As she headed toward the science division, she was confident that Reever, the section chief, would be just as understanding as Komui and just let her do what she needed to do. Although the science division usually took care of anything the exorcists would need, be it their uniforms or communication devices, even the repair of their anti-akuma weapons, it was not uncommon for Renge to come by and work on something independently.
"Hey, Renge! What brings you here today?" A tired looking man in this mid twenties asked, as he passed her, carrying a stack of papers.
"Hello, Section Chief Reever." She said politely, "I was wondering if I could borrow a workbench and work on something."
"Sure, not a problem, but you do know if you need something my team could always assist you." He said over his shoulder, pausing briefly to acknowledge her before he continued to make his way toward the Branch Head's office.
She smiled. "I know, but you guys always seem to be a little over worked." She called back to him, and entered the chaotic work space that is the science division. It was astonishing how much work the poor team had, and by the looks on everyone's faces she assumed that they had not slept in days. Finding a quiet corner, she began to set up everything she needed in order to make an enchanted device that would allow General Cross and herself to contact and track each other regardless of their distance and outside the realm of the Order's interference.
It was a simple device really, small nondescript, could be worn anywhere, and super effective, the only catch was she needed a blood sample from the two connected parties, that and enough magical competence to cast the correct spells on it. As she worked she tried her best to push out the images of that boy, even if she wanted to find him there was nothing she could do about it. A little part of her wished that there was some magic spell she could cast to either reveal to here where he was, or drive the memory of him out of her mind.
"Hey Renge! What are you working on?"
The chipper voice distracted her from her thoughts, bringing her back to reality. "Oh, hi Johnny." She said as her eyes fell upon the young scientist with the over-sized glasses. "Just a communicator."
He adjusted his glasses and took a closer look at what she was working on. It was a small crimson ring with tiny golden veins that ran through it like a current of electricity, if she had not told him it was a communicator he would have never guessed what it was. "Don't you already have a golem?"
The white lotus resting in her hair suddenly moved and its outer petals unraveled forming a pair of wings as it lifted itself off her head and fluttered over to Johnny, declaring its presence. She smiled, "Yes I do, and evidently Byakuren wants to make himself known."
"What a fascinating device!" He exclaimed as the little white golem landed on his hand, almost urging him to pet it. "Did you make this one too?"
"Oh no, he was a gift from my father, I am nowhere near capable of making something that complex." She replied as she lowered the two crimson rings into the incubator. "There, now I just have to wait ten days."
"Ten days?" He asked incredulously, the sudden jerking of his hands caused the golem to abruptly leave his hand and make its way back onto Renge's head.
She nodded, "Yup, ten days. Cells have to fuse and all."
"So what are you going to do with all that time?" He asked, hoping her answer was help out in the science division, god knows they needed all the help they could get. Besides, she might be young and an exorcist, but she knew her way around the lab better than some of the actual members of the science division, and that was saying a lot.
"I'm not sure," she said with a shrug, "Komui told me to relax, though I have yet to figure out what would entail. Maybe I'll go out to town a pick up some new clothes."
The mention of clothes made Johnny suddenly realize that she was not wearing an exorcist's uniform. He had not noticed it before because she still had the rose cross pinned to the front of her kimono, but she was wearing a black kimono tied with a bright red obi and white obijime. "You don't have an uniform?"
"Huh? Oh well I did, but it seems that I've grown over the past year and a half and well, it doesn't fit anymore." She barely finished her sentence before she was suddenly pulled to her feet with Johnny sprinting around her taking measurements. She had forgotten how passionate he could get about making their uniforms, not that she minded, having a new uniform that fit would be nice, and Johnny was always so attuned to each individual person's need.
Looking over his numbers he gave himself a satisfied nod, "I'm going to get started on this right away, hopefully I can get it to you by tomorrow morning!" He said as he scurried away, not even waiting for a response.
Thoughts of dinner and some delicious black sesame mochi filled her thoughts and she smiled to herself as she packed up her things. So far this trip was going pretty smoothly, the Branch Head accepted her abominable report, her communicator had been created without a hitch, she was getting a new uniform, all good things. Now all she had to do was figure out what to do for the next ten days, sleeping for days seemed like a good idea, though she figured at some point she would probably even get tired of that. They had a decent enough dojo she could train in, but she was lacking a sparring partner, Lenalee offered once, but quickly rescinded after about a minute, which did not surprise Renge in the least bit. The girl was a decent exorcist when push came to shove, but when it came down to it, she was just a fourteen year old girl, well twelve, the last time they sparred. Perhaps Noise Marie would be around, she had known him for as long as she could remember, and when he lost his sight seven years ago she had volunteered to train with him blind, which was immensely beneficial to both of them. Unfortunately, he was always out on missions, so she was doubtful that he would be available, although it did not hurt to try to track him down, but first, dinner. She had ten days to figure out what to do, and right now she needed food.
"Oh there you are!" A very out of breath girl exclaimed as she ran up to Renge and steadied herself on the table. "I've been looking all over for you."
"Hello to you too, Lenalee." She said with a small chuckle. "Miss me that much?"
"No, I mean yes, but not why I was looking for you." The younger girl took a moment to catch her breath, "It's just that Nii-san was looking for you, well he asked me to find you, said it was urgent."
Renge frowned, she had just left Komui's office, well just left a little over three hours ago, but still, she had just seen the man, why in the world would he need to see her again, and right now. She could not help but wonder if it was something to do with her so called report, maybe things were not going as smoothly as she had though, either way, there goes her thoughts about dinner. "Does he need to see me right now? Would I be able to grab some dinner first?"
Lenalee shook her head, "Sorry, I think dinner might have to wait, I spent the past half hour looking for you, I don't know what he needs you for, but it seemed serious."
Thanks for reading, let me know what you thought... chapter two will be up shortly. :)