Author's Note: I had the urge to read some of my stories recently. It's summer vacation, so I could do a lot of things, and though I have another story that I need to update before angry riots take to the streets, I couldn't help but type out another chapter to Wicker after reading one of my favourite shoujo mangas: Sugar Family. I'm not much of a romance-fanatic, but the humor was just too yummy to deny. Anyway, this idea I came up with after serious thought, and one could say that it's a sequel to Consonance Conditioner which is one of my one shots. Thanks for reading and please review.
Third One-Shot: Dear, Sister.
Eve looked up again from her recently borrowed tome where the words The Lost Faces were in a bold tarnished white of the paperback cover. She had pulled her hair back into a braid to keep her locks from trapping the summer heat that was only magnified beneath the metal roof of the car. Thankfully to all riders present Sven's driving was at a speed enough to blow out most of the unbearable warmth.
The said driver was looking faintly worried. For the past three hours they had been travelling along an endless strip of road with dry grassland on either side of the locomotive and a cloudless sky bright blue overhead. He feared rain and he feared them becoming lost in the middle of nowhere. Yet the map pointed to the same direction each time he checked it.
"Maybe we should get a GPS," Train had commented earlier. "You know, one of those satellite things."
"If you have the money, be my guest," Sven snapped, "I hope you haven't forgotten how deep in debt we are as we speak."
Indeed, their goal to repay all of their loans was looking farther and farther away, and their most recent target, a five hundred thousand priced Rhonny Bridges who was charged for murder and kidnapping on an unbelievable scale, was as far away from them geographically as they felt their ability to relinquish their debts were metaphorically.
Eve suddenly looked up. "I remember this place," she said.
Sven deflated, watching her from the corner of his eyes worriedly. "We haven't been going around in circles, have we?"
"No," she shook her head and pointed. "That sign up ahead. I remember it from Tearju's hometown. Maybe we can stop by her place for a night."
Sven blew out a sigh with quick calculation. "Well, we've been driving for a day and a half straight, so I suppose we can risk a night." He took the turn. "Nothing much has changed, has it?" He glanced in the rear-view mirror and adjusted it, realizing that Train had fallen asleep. "I was wondering why it was so quiet," he remarked, and Eve looked over her shoulder, then back to her book.
They pulled up before the mansion not too long after, and found the retired professor sitting on her porch with a cookbook in her hands. She appeared just as academic as Eve was over her personal studies. She looked up and smiled. "Hello, Sven," she greeted and glanced over his shoulder at the car. "Are you the only one here?"
"No, uh," he smiled and looked back at the car with a chuckle. "Eve's waking up Train."
Easier said than done, Eve realized the task was. The humidity had knocked him out completely. She huffed, pulling her bangs behind her ears and glaring at Train, lying haphazardly on the backseat. He snored quietly.
"Train, if you don't wake up now, then I'll win our bet."
He shifted. Eve grinned. "Fine, then. I win."
Train's grin was beaming energy from his nap. He'd spent his time after a heavy lunch searching Tearju's home for a cool and high placed napping area before he encountered Eve in a sunny hallway. She purposefully stood in his way, and he paused. "Something up, Princess?"
"I've won my bet, so you have to face the penalty," she said simply.
His smile fell and he stared. "Bet? What bet?"
"You failed to wake up, so I won."
"That…I don't remember…" he froze, having caught a flash of her deathly and resolute glare. "What's the penalty anyway?"
"Regard me as your older sister for the rest of the day."
He placed his hands into his pockets with careful consideration. Thinking of Eve as older was a simple understatement these days. She grew up already, nineteen years old, a sweeper in her own right, an adult. A grown woman physically, matured in every aspect—she'd always been the older sister mentally, but Train had the height to playfully deny that. Now, he had a little less to deny.
He sighed, looking out the nearest window. "Does it have to be an older sister?"
"Yes," she backfired. "I'd admit that I wanted a cuter younger brother"—here Train internally flinched and smiled uncomfortably—"but Sven doesn't seem eager to raise any biological children anytime soon."
Train chuckled. "Why? Did you ask him?"
"Yes, actually," she crossed her arms. "He didn't respond."
Train laughed. "Alright, I'll live up to my side of the bet." He smirked cattishly, "Onee-chan."
She nodded. "And don't forget that you can talk to me about anything, okay?"
They had started walking again. Still behaving immaturely he asked, "So, nee-chan, where do babies come from?"
Without so much as a flinch, she responded.
By morning, the kitchen was full of palpable smoke. Sven stepped out of the chaos with a dry throat, and Tearju was expertly handling the extinguisher. With tears in his eyes, apron stained, and a frying pan black from the soot of gutted eggs, Train had to grin. The depth and the biology of Eve's explanation yesterday had left him emotionally disturbed, hence his laugh wasn't as enthusiastic as it could have been, but it made no difference to the annoyed Sven.
"Why don't you cook occasionally?" Volfeid questioned.
Train shrugged, "You and Eve said you didn't like ramen as much as I did."
"It's unhealthy," Sven corrected, "to eat nothing but cup noodles and milk."
"C'mon, milk is healthy. Babies live off of it." A reminder of yesterday's anatomy came to mind and he shivered.
"I said 'too much', and we aren't babies."
Train leaned on a wall as he watched the black smog clear. "Eve wants a baby brother, did you know that?"
"Yeah, ever since you were shot by the Lucifer Bullet and shrank to an impish size she'd been going on about that." He dusted his apron and looked up as though he had noticed something. "Where is Eve, anyway?"
"Probably still sleeping. The heat would do that to you, you know."
"Best wake her up," Sven started to re-enter the kitchen. "We have to leave early after all."
Train turned on his heel. "A-okay, Sven-daddy."
Eve was sleeping, and rather peacefully as well. The thin glass curtains had filtered the morning sunlight just enough to illuminate her borrowed room without waking her, and the summer breeze was pleasantly warm. The boarded room was so tranquil that even Train as he entered felt like falling asleep himself. He recognized Eve beneath the covers and watched her a moment. It was weird to think that Lil' Princess had grown to be a woman, in just a little over six years, yet nineteen seemed like such a volatile age. At that moment he wished she had chosen him as the older sibling.
"Yo, sis," he called, and couldn't help himself from grinning.
Her eyes opened. "Train, what do you want?"
"I fell down the stairs," he lied casually.
Eve who was still rubbing her eyes displayed clear drowsiness and he kneeled beside her bed. "How unfortunate," she stated. "Is that all?"
"Well you said I could tell you anything, right?" Before she could comment he said, "I broke a tooth."
"Oh," she contorted her index finger into a thin handled small mirror, and instantly, with the large white dress slightly draping off of the gentle curve of her shoulder and her collected and responsible expression, she vaguely resembled a dentist: perhaps an alluring one at that. "Let me see."
He opened his mouth and she put a hand under her chin as she leaned forward slightly. "Are you sure it's broken? I don't see anything significant to that effect."
"Probably because it isn't."
She frowned but her reaction didn't open the distance between them. He leaned forward and kissed her gently on her mouth. He didn't stay for more than a few heartbeats, but during that thin duration she hadn't pulled away, hadn't pushed him back. When he finally did pull back, Eve had a strange expression. She was frowning, her eyes castigating and cruel, but her lips were upturned and bright.
"That's known as incest, you know," she stated.
Train grinned. "Who cares?"
Tearju looked at the slightly burnt egg in her plate and pulled back strands of golden hair. Sven was seated exhaustedly in a nearby chair, half asleep. "Where is Train and Eve already?"
"Maybe sleeping?" Tearju mused. "It is rather hot out."
And her guess wasn't too far from the truth.
