…How did a week turn into a month?!
Well, we're moving right now… Kiiiiind of. It took a while to find a place, but we did. And then there's the problem of packing, and then my dad saying: You know what, I don't think I want to move anymore… /starts un-packing/ on second thought, let's move after all! /starts packing again/ then again… /unpacks/ still… /packs/
In other news.. squee! Thankies to my reviewers I hope I can keep the ficcy interesting.
Leland Lancaster: Thanks for the kind words. It's nice to know that people enjoy reading something I write.
Kiri-san no neko-shoujou: Eep. Sorry, I'll try to tone down the humor so you can sleep better. ;
Uzu-chan: I inspired the Axl ficcy? O.O Woo hoo! I did a good deed, I shall go eat a cookie now!
Flaming Freak of Boredom: I was wondering if someone would ask about that… I look at it like this: if Signas is insane enough to keep Zero around, why not hire Dynamo? He's got to be turning a blind eye for the amount of butt they can kick, regardless of past problems. Besides, his personality alone promises fun fun fun! /shot/
Lun: /sweat drop/ Yeah, I noticed that too, but writing IS a learning experience, isn't it? I'll just have to try harder from now on! nod nod
I own noooothing. Most certainly not Rockman X or any of the characters, or any of the song lyrics in any of the chapters.
Chapter 5: Something Lighter
Song: Independent (Instrumental)
One simple word summed up Dynamo's mission in life: Mischief.
He lived for it, devoted his free time and lack there of to it. He could, and would, plot for months on end just for the look of shock that would flitter across someone's face. Baiting, pestering, poking and prodding; instilling chaos like a wraith swooping down on a village and flinging cows at random people.
It was a skill.
…One that most people didn't live long with, at least in this line of business with all the trigger happy reploids running around.
"And you're suuuure you don't care that they're alone right now?"
It was a lot like having the Grim Reaper on call 24/7. In fact, he could have sworn he saw the flash of metal out of the corner of his eye whenever he opened his mouth around people with a history of violence. And of going maverick and running around with a lit beam saber, that was a requirement too.
As often as he was around Zero, it looked like the harbinger of death didn't belong to a union.
"Shut up." It was low, menacing, enough to make most hunters in their right minds run, but still not quite the response he wanted. Oh no, that wouldn't come until later, when he had Zero's patience teetering on edge and his fingers twitched towards his weapon.
Push push, prod prod…
Besides, it wasn't an answer. It was a command with an underlying death threat, but not an answer.
"All alone without another person to watch them…" Zero opened his mouth to snap something, thought better of it and tried the ignoring tactic. Something that had been tried, tested, and proven to fail 97% of the time, at least on Dynamo.
Now one might ask, why is he baiting Zero again? You'd think that he would be working on the project he started last week!
Actually, in a way he was. He just wasn't about to turn up at the festival by himself. And it wasn't that he didn't trust his sneaking skills, because he did. It was that X was more experienced, and both he and Axl had sharper eyes than most. It was just something that went along with being a gun/buster toting hunter. On the upside, it meant that they could pick off mavericks from long distance, an asset to any group and it cut down on his workload. Always a good thing!
On the downside, it made spying on them a bitch.
So needless to say, they would probably spot his mane in a crowd without having to look twice. Axl would probably invite him along for the heck of it, and X wouldn't comment since this was Axl's trip. He would respect his decisions, but he'd mentally be coming up with ways to get back at Dynamo for the rest of the day.
So it was more him covering his own ass to have someone else go. That way, he could hide behind the semblance of two people out for the fun of it and stay aloof.
"Don't you know what people do without proper adult supervision?"
In this case, he was trying for Zero since Alia wouldn't go just to spy. She'd want to walk around and take pictures of cosplayers. And look at the booths. And stop and pet stray animals and coo at them… all things that didn't fall under reconnaissance.
"I mean, they could be killing each other right now…" He trailed off, smiling cheerfully. "Or" He trailed off again, but this time it was to pause for dramatics.
Well, that and so Zero could get his threat in.
…What? It was a time honored tradition! Besides, it was boring if it was a one sided monologue.
Zero was a blaring reminder as to why the ignoring tactic only worked 3% of the time. "I'm going to stick my beam saber up your-"
"-Assuming that I'm right," He plowed on over the death threats from the supposedly un-touchable Red Devil. He smiled brightly and swung an arm around his shoulders, pulling him closer as he stuck a hand forward, as if reaching for something they couldn't see, "They're making out."
…Never mind the fact that it was unlikely as hell.
All that mattered was that Zero should have known better. So of course it was his own fault if he became paranoid, and Dynamo nodded mentally in agreement to this. "Or they found a more secluded space to avoid prying eyes and-" He blinked and stopped at the sight of a beam saber in front of his nose. "I thought we learned that violence was not the answer in therapy, Zero."
"I never finished."
"Why?"
"Because I kicked the guy out a window that's why!"
He could almost feel the icy hand on his shoulder before he opened his mouth. "………You could always just go there and you know, stay out of sight-"
"…Go. To. Hell." At this point, someone would normally be flying through a wall.
Yep, Zero was deffinetely having an off week.
"…Wanna talk about it?"
"No, I don't want to- there isn't anything to talk about!"
God, I know that you have this thing about hating me since I'm pretty much evil-incarnate, but I'm practically the Kenny of the base, don't I suffer enough?!(1)
"…"
"…"
"I was tempted to ask Alia to go, but want to be my date instead?'
…Deffinetely going to kick that nun.
-------------
"Excuse me! Mr. Kenshin!" Someone halfway yelled, and Axl turned to be greeted by the sight of a girl hopping up and down in the crowd, waving in an attempt to get his attention. "Can I take your picture?!""Ohhhh…." Well, that was a part of dressing up, he chided himself. Random Otaku's and fangirls bobbed up and down and went trigger-happy with their cameras. "Um, sure!" He sent his Beam-of-absolute-cheeriness and he stepped back until he was against the wall, out of the flow of traffic. He directed the Beam at X, who raised an eyebrow in response. He closed his eyes and put his hands behind his back and he raised the other eyebrow in question.
Oh, like he didn't know what was coming…
"Well? Want to get your picture taken?"
"…Hell no?"
"Awww, c'mon, she might even ask for an autograph." He murmured for X's ears alone, cheering inwardly at the deer-in-headlights look that jumped across X's face at the suggestion. He fought the urge to laugh when X shuddered, reliving a bad memory of some rabid fangirl chasing him down a street.
"Um… I think I'll grab a soda from that vender we passed!" He said in a rush, hoping his voice hadn't raised an octave and, pointing down the street, turned on a dime and started to half-walk half-run.
…And they said that fame didn't have a price? Axl gave a half-hearted pose with his thumb on the bottom of the hilt, the cheery smile wholly his own and ruining the seriousness. She squee-d, taking a quick picture before turning her eyes to where X was ever-so-slowly making a selection and holding up a line. The people behind him started muttering under their breath, making him oh-so-slowly pull out his wallet. Oh look at that, he dropped something!
"Aww… I wish my brother would cosplay with me sometime." She sighed wistfully before smiling again, not catching the sight of his mouth opening in an 'o' of surprise as she trotted off after another cosplayer.
Brother?!
He didn't even look up when X came back, something that made him pause. Not that he was complaining about the quiet for a change, but the ooc-ness of it was something that worried him.
That and the dazed, non-blinking stare into absolute space was starting to freak him out.
"Oy!" He snapped, leaning forward to shake the younger reploid. The action seemed to make it worse, as his eyes closed halfway and he started to mumble under his breath.
"Related… related…"
"…" He opened his mouth to comment, but nothing came. Because this is the kind of thing you know you should have some thought on, but your mind is stuck on the oddness of the moment and you can't find anything to say.
…Moving past the mumbling and the fact that he was worrying for what there was of Axl's sanity, he was hit by such a random and strange thought that he was sure it would work. "Look! A Sano!"
If he'd have blinked, he would have missed it. The dazed look passed to one of wide-eyed shock in a split second and he hopped up, scanning the crowd on his toes. "Where?!" He demanded, one arm rising up to block out the sunlight as he swayed from one foot to the other, looking for a trace of a white jacket before he squeaked as X grabbed his arm and dragged him back to earth.
"You were floating up in the clouds. Where were you, and why didn't you call?"
"Ah… Sorry. The Otaku said something."
"Which would be…?"
"Um… shethoughtyouweremybrother."
X blinked once, twice, and tilted his head to the side at the garble that had just run out of Axl's mouth, pausing a moment to just stare at the fidgeting hunter before he leaned against the wall. "I caught half of that. Want to slow down a bit kid?"
"She thought... you were my brother." He blushed, just a little embarrassed. A little. Really!
Okay, maybe more than a little. Was he supposed to be happy that someone thought that they were related? If they were acting like brothers, it meant that they were getting along on some level. Even siblings who acted like they hated each other cared deep down.
..Right?!
If he was an anime character, he might have sweat dropped.
"Oh. Want me to change her mind when she comes back?" Axl didn't know that you could say something so innocently and have such an evil look on your face at the same time. That had to be a skill.
More reason to not trust that smile; it reminded him of a shark with a big, 'give me a hug' grin. There was an evil plot spinning inside that head, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know what it was.
Meaning he had to.
…Damned curiosity! "How?"
"Oh, you'll see…" He trailed off, standing upright when the noticed the girl from before heading their way. "I love you bro!" He squee-d, clapping his hands together before they were rested against his cheek, the whole show making him look a lot younger than he really was.
"AwwwW?" She started, the coo at the display of brotherly affection turning into a squeak, eyes growing to the size of dinner plates when he reached over, took his brothers face in his hand, and pulled him in for a kiss.
Well, at least she wasn't the only one who squeaked, because Axl sure as heck made some sort of noise. X was shaking with barely repressed laughter, keeping his thumb between their mouths with one hand as he slipped the other arm around to the back of his neck to pull him closer.
Needless to say, she ran. Obviously not a slash fan. Or at least not an incest one.
"You," Axl started, feeling his cheeks absolutely burn as he pointed in X's direction. He narrowed his eyes when he was met with an innocent grin, because that didn't belong on that face anymore! "Are evil."
"Thanks." He smiled again, pushing off from the wall with all the grace of a servant of hell. Which Axl was starting to think he was. A minion of the dark, who had been posing as a perfectly moral hunter until it was safe to show his true colors… he idly wondered why Zero wasn't leading the trail of torment.
Oh yeah, because they weren't getting along. Scratch the above theory, they all knew who the resident evil-incarnate was.
"You realize that she's accusing us of incest now. And the crowd is making sure to keep their distance too." Well, some of the crowd. Most just shrugged it off or pretended it didn't happen, but a few people were openly glaring. He smiled weakly and rubbed the back of his neck when a mother of two pulled her children to her protectively, glaring at him the whole while.
"Oh, who cares? It's not like we'll see any of them again." He grinned at said mother and grabbed Axl's hand, raising an eyebrow in mock surprise when she stared at him as if he'd shot a nun and trotted off, the calls of, 'mommy what's that person doing?' following behind.
"I'd rather not be stoned later, if that's all right with you…"
"Fine fine, I want to head to the booths anyway." He just shrugged everything off. And why shouldn't he? The fact that he had corrupted some innocent Otaku and a couple of children didn't weigh upon his conscious at all.
Wait, where was his conscious?
(As if in response to the dark deeds of his charge, Chibi X shuddered. He took a sip of his fruity drink to try and calm his nerves, but it didn't help. If anything, the fact that he was drinking something alcoholic just sent his morals into overdrive. "Are you SURE I shouldn't be heading back yet?"
"Of course I am!" Chibi Zero frowned at the over-worked angel and kicked his feet about in the pool. "He's a good guy; he can handle himself for a while." As an afterthought, helped by the fact that X was now holding an empty glass, he grabbed the startled angel and tried to drag him towards the bar.
Something stronger was deffinetely needed to calm his nerves.
"I mean, we've only been gone a few days; what could go wrong?"
"…The fact that you can even ask that scares me! A lot can go wrong in just a few days!"
With a long suffering sigh and the realization that X was not going to go anywhere near that bar until he felt better, Zero flicked his forked tail and sat them both down at a nearby table. "Look, whatever it is, you know that they can handle it on their own." He started rubbing X's palm in slow, soothing circles, and smiled encouragingly. "And besides, when was the last time you took a break from being a martyr?"
He was met by a blank stare, as if the idea was foreign.
"That's what I thought! Now c'mon, I'll even let you play with my pitchfork later!)
Well, that explains the no remorse thing.
"Look at it this way; you'll never be able to say you weren't jumped by a ranking officer."
…That was an upside?
At least no one seemed to care or remember the little incident within ten minutes. That or they had just lost anyone who did in the crowd. Axl bobbed happily, smiling at X's actual bobbing blue spikes and every now and then grabbed his arm to cry, "What's that?" and drag him to a booth.
Good times, good times.
His bobbing brought him to a halt outside a particularly bright booth with accessories of all color and enough metal to blind people who were viewing it at the wrong angle. There, under lock and key and about an inch of bullet-proof glass was a silver loop of a curled up kitsune, sitting there innocently, like it wasn't calling him at all.
Lies!
"And you're drooling at…" Axl jammed his finger against the glass, diagonal to the loop as he resisted the urge to start bouncing on the balls of his feet like a kid.
"It's pretty…"
"It's shiny…"
"It's not that expensive…"
"So get it." So easily said!
"I don't have pierced ears." He lamented with a wistful sigh, though it might have sounded more like a whine to anyone else.
"Is that the only problem?" X sounded incredulous, like it had been a silly thing to even have to ask. He didn't even stop to wait for an answer before he grabbed the hem of Axl's Keikogi and started to drag him away from the kitsune, ignoring how Axl waved his arms towards it in protest.
"No… not there either…" X muttered under his breath, frowning in thought as he turned his head from one direction to the other, ignoring anything else in the crowd until he let out an 'ah hah!' of triumph.
Axl blinked and finally turned to look at the direction they were headed, feeling his stomach sink to his feet at the sight of a bright booth with a red sign reading 'Claire's'.
It had been looming in the distance, but every step brought them just a little closer. A little closer…
He regretted ever opening his mouth; it had been a wistful comment, damn it, he didn't mean that he wanted to get it now!
…Okay! So he had meant he wanted to get it now, but he wasn't willing to suffer through the pain to wear it!
"Um… where are we going?"
He had a bad feeling. A bad, bad feeling. Which only got worse when he was greeted by the completely innocent look on X's face.
…That halo was being held up by horns!
"You're the one who said you wanted that earring. Then again, with your personality I would have assumed you would already have at least one…"
"Oh, and I'm sure you of all people have holes all over the place?" He was greeted by a superior smile as X tugged on his shirt, pulling it up to reveal the expanse of his stomach and…
A bellybutton ring?
"You're kidding!" Axl gawked.
All the distraction he needed to grab his arm and drag him to the nice lady with the gun.
A/N: 1) Kenny. Southpark. Zero pretty much is the Kenny of the series, next to Sigma.
Hm… you know, the next chapter is mostly done. Really! ; I lied tho, Alia doesn't get a bigger part for another chapter or two. /pout/ The only scene I have left to write for the next chappy is the one where I'm debating a couple of things. ; Hopefully it'll be up in a few days.
1)
Ow. Ow ow ow, the pain owwwww" He whined, putting one hand over the damaged ear as if it could stop the ache. Which it didn't, because life isn't fair like that most of the time.
"Oh, stop being such a baby, you've been through worse." X batted the hand away, leaning forward for a better view of the small, temporary silver loop. "I think it's fitting." He murmured, the rush or warm breath against his still hyper-sensitive ear making him shiver.
"Really?"
"Mmmhm."
2)
Damn those eyes, promising peace and calm if he just went along, and... he swallowed, for all the world feeling like this was just some big joke and that it was all on him; he wanted to laugh, if only to soothe his nerves but what would that have made the enemy? That he was unstable or that he was beyond panic; a poor creature awaiting death and snapping mentally in the realization.
Hell no, he didn't need to be shot any sooner, thanks.
"We should wait for backup." Let the other Hunters take care of this one, he didn't care. All he wanted to do was drag X to a place where he wouldn't have that look, like the all world was his prey and he was going to spring at something any second now.
Review pleaaaaase?