Chapter 2:
The early morning sun peeped through a thin gap between the curtains. The broken bed from the previous night had been pushed into the corner to avoid anyone tripping over it in the night. The thin stream of light landed on the silver haired boy's face, making him try to hide from the sun. Though in his failed effort he ended up sitting up slowly, taking in his surroundings. He gradually came to realise that he was no longer in Lavi's bed...but Yu Kanda's.
"EHH!" He screamed loudly, leaping from the bed. Only to end up taking all the sheets with him and landing in a heap on the wooden floor.
"Baka moyashi. You're too loud." Yu growled, not impressed that he had been so rudely awoken.
"W-why was I..." Allen could feel himself blushing furiously.
"You moved into my bed because that idiot kept clinging to you." Kanda explained bluntly. Allen suddenly remembered last night when he had to keep prying Lavi off him. "We will never speak of this again." He added; not wanting people to find out they shared a bed.
"Agreed." Even through Allen's screaming, the red-haired bookman was still fast asleep on the other side of the room.
"God Allen, you're seriously loud in the morning." Eiko said, when they appeared at the breakfast table in the café part of the B&B.
"Yeah, we heard you from down here. What happened?" Nanashi laughed through a mouth of toast.
"N-nothing." The silver-haired boy replied quickly.
Nanashi and Eiko looked at each other and grinned slyly.
"Oooh really?" Nanashi sniggered.
"Didn't sound like nothing to me.''
After being threatened by Kanda, the two girls remained quiet. And all in good time as soon after, Lavi decided to join the group - now looking quite perky despite still having droopy bed hair.
"Right so today we need to find some information on the innocence. We'll split into groups of two and we can meet up later to discuss our progress." Lenalee explained, taking charge of the group.
"Hai!"
"Nothing after all that searching." Nanashi sighed, leaning against a wall that was bathed in shade.
"I'm sure something will come up." Eiko said, removing her exorcist jacket.
"Excuse me…" The girls turned their attention to woman, probably in her late thirties. "I need your help." She said. "I think my husband's cheating on me and I tried asking some people with the same jackets as you to help but they said it wasn't their job to do things like that. Please, I need your help." She begged, pulling out a small brown bag from her pocket. "I can pay you."
Nanashi took the bag from the woman and shook it next to her ear. "It's under our normal fee." She mumbled.
"Not going to take it?" Eiko asked quietly.
"On the contrary. She might be able to give us some info." The black-haired teen turned back to the woman, who by this time looked like she was going to have a nervous breakdown. "Give us all the information on your husband and this affair and-"
"So you will help me?"
"Under one condition. Along with this fee we would also like everything you know about the walking dead." Nanashi demanded, pocketing the money. The woman who they learned was called Layla, nodded and told them everything she knew.
"That was easier than I thought." Eiko mused as they headed towards the bazaar, which would be the easiest place to find someone. "You sure you can find him in this mess?"
"Naturally, I have a photographic memory." Nanashi bragged, and glanced around the crowded market place. "Follow me," she ordered quietly, then marched off through the crowd.
They followed a tall, dark-skinned man with black, clean-cut hair through a series of empty streets.
"Hey, are you Akiiki?" Eiko questioned after the man had stopped in a deserted street.
The man looked rather scared when he turned around to see two teenagers watching him from the shadows.
"Time for some interrogation." the black-haired teen smirked, cracking her knuckles.
"Can't we do this the easy way?" Eiko asked.
"The easy way is boring."
Eiko sighed in surrender and leaned against back against the wall.
"You don't like my way 'cause you're lazy." Nanashi laughed, out of the corner of her eye she noticed the man was trying to sneak away so she grabbed a nearby barrel and hurtled it him. "YOU GO NO WHERE!" She growled dangerously.
"He's not an akuma you know, he can sustain injuries." Eiko pointed out, not diturbed at all by her friends violence.
"Anyone who cheats on their wife should be."
"I'm stood right here, I can hear you…" Akiiki muttered timidly, shoving the broken bits of wood from his lap.
"I can see that."
"Who are you people?"
"Just people….Your wife sent us because of something called an 'affair'?" Nanashi explained walking over to the man.
"I don't know what you're on about." Akiiki stuttered nervously, his timid voice suggesting otherwise.
"Fine, have it your way..." Nanashi sighed. "Innocence, activate."
The teens left arm turned a bright crimson colour as a black cross appeared on her hand and her finger also turned black and morphed into the claws of a dragon. She slammed her newly transformed hand into the stone wall behind the man's head. "I'm going to ask you again." She stared down at him, a mocking kindness playing in her smile.
"I think Layla wants her husband back in one piece, you know."
"She'll have her husband back in several pieces if it gets my job done!" Nanashi snapped, glaring at the man in front of her who looked like he was going to pass out from fear.
"Well, actually she never said she wanted her husband back…only to confirm whether or not he had an affair." Eiko mumbled randomly to herself, noticing a pair of silhouettes on a nearby rooftop. She eyed them suspiciously for a moment, then tilted her head to the ground as though she hadn't noticed.
"Yay for interrogation." Nanashi cheered, her eyes holding a brighter glint now as she proceeded to do her 'job'.
"Eh? He passed out already." She complained less than three minutes after she had started hurling verbal and psychical abuse at Akiiki. Her shoulders slumped unhappily with the short amount of time she had.
"Okay, you've had your fun. We're being watched." Eiko stated seriously, gesturing to the roofs with her head. Her friend looked around but saw nobody.
"Riiiight. I think the heat's getting to you." Nanashi laughed. Eiko furrowed her eyebrows and glanced back up to where they once stood.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" Lenalee yelled as she appeared on the scene with Allen behind her.
Nanashi looked down at the unconscious man on the floor. "HENTAI!" She yelled, kicking him furiously in the ribs before storming off.
There was a stunned silence lasting only a few seconds until Eiko, who was trying but failing at hiding a smile of amusement, turned to them and said, "I think that was pretty much self-explanatory."
Then she skirted around them and walked swiftly after her dark-haired friend.
"Quick thinking." She said with a short laugh once she had caught up to her.
"Naturally. I'm the hands-on one. I have to be quick."
"But in all seriousness, there were definitely people there." Eiko said shortly.
"Well, even if there were, they obviously don't want anything to do with us. Just forget it."
A couple of houses away, now sitting on the roof of a small building, were the two figures. One of which was placing cards delicately on the floor in front of him, contemplating each one as it was laid down.
"So those two new ones do private stuff as well." Rhode concluded, after a moment of thoughtful silence.
"So it would seem."
"I could..." She paused, softly biting her thumbnail. "...get them to check up on Allen for me."
"Huh?" Tyki looked up at her. "Why?"
"He was in bed with that idiot red-head!" She said loudly, a hint of anger lacing her voice. "Not only that, but this morning when I went back, he was with the ponytail-man!"
"...So?"
She huffed. "I don't like the thought that my Allen could be with someone else in that kind of relationship."
"Hmmm." Tyki hummed in response, bringing his attention back down to his cards.
"So I can always get those two to do it." She said, nodding her at the two girls heading back for the bazaar.
"They're exorcists, just like Allen." Tyki interrupted. "What makes you think they'll do something for a Noah?"
"Oh, I can always give them a little something." She replied swiftly. "...I don't think they're the type to do it without some kind of benefit, after all. The bag that woman gave them was probably some kind of payment." She continued.
"I get the feeling that small bag wouldn't be enough to satisfy them." Tyki replied, laying another card. "She probably gave them some information as well."
"I'll just give them lots of money, the Earl will give it to me. If that doesn't draw their attention then I'll just go to extra lengths." She smiled darkly.
Tyki frowned at her. "Yes well, you go ahead and do that. But what I was implying then was that that woman could have had some information that was important to the exorcists. And what kind of information is most important to exorcists?"
Rhode was silent for a moment, and then she smirked up at Tyki. "The Innocence."
"That's right." He said, then got to his feet. His cards now sat in his pocket. He tipped his hat forward slightly and looked in the direction of the old woman's house. "The Innocence."