The sun shone bright when the bullies taken aback at a strange interference on their evil scheme. Mishima Lisa had use the distraction of that weird boy to take a run from her bullies. As the unfamiliar brunette looking boy laughing when looking at them, Lisa feel herself become composed and take her feet to run. One of the girls took caution of her attempt and instruct her to stop, but the short-raven girl doesn't take those heed. She already took a corner at the exit gate and vanished from their eye-sights.

The boy—Twelve made a bigger smirk on the side of his cheek knowing the girl take the cue of his interruption. He look absently at where the girl was gone while he still floated, full-clothing on the center of the pool.

"Toji, come back here. We're almost late"

Twelve turn his head to where the voice came from and had to blink his eyes twice when Nine addressing him with that fake name. The sound of it have weird ring on his ears but the color that come out from Nine voice is calming blue like usual. Like its normal for him to address Twelve with such a thing. Somehow he found it amusing

"Alright Arata, I'm coming!" shout back Twelve with a bright smile and a salute before swam his way back to the tip of pool floors. Nine eyes squinted a bit at the sound of his fake name reaching his ears, but he quickly back to his composure.

Name is such a foreign thing to these boys. It's something they once owned and granted, but it was already gone from their life as toll of normal childhood they supposed to have.

Even they are already used hundreds of names in order to survive, the sound of it still strange on their tongue or something feel amiss on their auditory sense when they call each other as such. And both of them doesn't even know why

"Name is the symbol of love. But for you who have been abandoned, love does not exist. From now on, you all will call yourself with numbers"

That's their earliest memory from that condemned place. And before they know it, they already forgot their real name too.

Twelve climb up from the pool ladder. His body becoming twice heavier as he rise up and water splashing out from all of his bodies. He twist his clothes to dispose the remaining of liquid, climb back to the fence, take his bag, and walk away as if nothing happened. He doesn't even give those girls a second glance as they doesn't move even move an inch to grab his attention or stop him.

"We're not even arrived at school and you already make such a big mess like this?" ask Nine annoyed. Twelve just grinned goofily and put his arm to his pocket nonchalantly.

"Well, those girls have such an ugly colors! I just can't helped myself but make fun of them a little bit" answer him innocently as though there's nothing wrong from his action. Nine doesn't comment on that remark and made his focus back to the road.

As silence washing them on their walk, he remembered the reason why he jumped to that pool. That girl with short raven hair, the one being bullied, her voice is so enchanting to his eyes even there are some ugly ripple and hole of lies when she spoke to him. It's not fiery red like his or cold blue like Nine or any boring colors he usually saw on his life. It was a smooth, not-so-sparkly pale yellow. That color reminded him of sunshine shone through the layers of curtain on their apartment or maybe the color of tiny flowers he saw at the window of Settlement. He can't grasp feeling about it very well, but it gave him a soothing and warm feeling to his chest. Even make his mood better and his mind in peace.

But well, the girl itself is not going to be important anyway. Regardless, he was glad he had saved her.

The wind coming from cars suddenly came through when they take step off from the overpass. Twelve flinch a bit at the cold and he smiled as he wrap his finger through his body, pretending to tremble.

"Arata-kun, I'm cold here!" mock Twelve with a girlie voice and trying to make his eyes bigger like a puppy. Nine look at him irritably and walk faster with his arms on his pocket. Obviously annoyed. Twelve chuckled a bit at his brother sudden bad mood.

Haha i think some part on this story is a -i don't know mess? i feel a bit unsatisfied on this chapter.
Do someone interested to be proofreader for this fic?

I will update this weekly if my IRL doesn't suck my time up to dry.
Thank you for reading!