ChapterEleven
Maka's POV
Maka ran up the stairs of the DWMA, hoping that Crona had returned to his room. Usually whenever the timid boy got really upset he would run back in his room and huddle in the corner, but since Maka knew where he hid and she was the reason he was upset, Crona may have gone somewhere else to calm down. Maka had already made a very quick canvas of the streets around her apartment building, which had taken longer than she had expected. She trotted down the halls, craning her neck to keep an eye out for his notable light lavender hair or crisp white uniform. "You!" A buff boy snarled the word out like a curse, his large hand wrapping around her throat and lifting her off of the ground. "Where the hell is your little pink-haired freak of a boyfriend, Albarn?" Behind him, another boy and a girl that Maka distantly remembered from class stood there, both scowling at her.
Maka jabbed the muscular boy in the nerves of his armpit, forcing him to drop her. "If you want to engage in a duel, the proper protocol is to challenge me or Crona verbally. Don't ever touch me like that again, and don't call Crona a freak."
"She talks a lot like pinky." The girl sneered nastily at Maka, arms folded firmly across her chest.
"Boom!" The second boy cheered, making his hands fly apart like an explosion.
"I'm going to rip fa-reaky to shreds the next time I see him," the first boy seethed, the fingers of his left hand shifting into small knives. "Next time, I won't let him up until he begs for mercy, the little twerp!"
"What are you talking about?"Maka asked, getting a bad feeling and a strong suspicion.
"Fa-reaky attacked us! Hit me in the stomach, and socked Hayden there in the chest."
Hayden nodded solemnly, wincing as he coughed, scarlet staining his palm as he covered his mouth.
"Crona wouldn't attack without provocation." Maka said suspiciously, eyeing the three. "You wouldn't happen to have been bullying him, would you?"
All three blanched, confirming Maka's theory. "What the hell do you take us for? Monsters like him? Yeah, right. And even if we had, that freak would have had it coming."
Maka poked the buff boy on his chest, giving him a dirty look. "If I ever hear that any of you have been picking on Crona again, I'll take this up with Lord Death." She turned away and started to walk off, when a thought occurred to her. "Are you the reason that he was covered in bruises?"
"No. I wish we were, though. That monster shouldn't be here, and you should be ashamed of yourself for associating with him." The girl flipped Maka off as the trio stormed away, the two boys holding their torsos gingerly.
Maka jogged on down to Crona's room, the hall darker than usual as she trotted down the stone steps to his dungeon-like room. She had tried to talk to Lord Death and her father about either getting Crona an apartment room in the building that she and Soul lived in or letting him move in with them, that way she could still keep an eye on him and he could get out of these depressing surroundings, but they kept putting it off. Maka told herself that it was high time she cornered her dad while he wasn't able to move, that way he couldn't escape but she still could if Spirit got too clingy. She finally got to Crona's room, knocking softly on the large door. "Crona?" There was no reply, which wasn't surprising. He usually took a while to respond when he was upset, Crona having started to try and hide his tears since she had told him that seeing him in pain hurt her. "Crona, I'm sorry about what I said. I was upset, and I took it out on you. May I please come in?" Still nothing. The absence of a response began to worry Maka, and she knocked again. "Crona?"
The door clicked open, light streaming into the hall. Maka sighed in relief, quickly walking into his Spartan-like room. "Crona, I'm really sorry-" She cut herself off and gaped at Blair, the pretty woman changing back into her cat form. Maka frowned as she felt a small twinge of what felt like jealousy wriggle in the pit of her stomach, immediately pushing that thought into the furthest corner of her mind. "What the heck are you doing in here, Blair?"
"I was enjoying a nice nap, nyaow." Blair stretched luxuriously on Crona's bed before sitting and yawning at Maka. Maka's eye twitched unconsciously as the blond Maister tried to figure out what the cat was doing in Crona's room.
"Where's Crona?"
"I don't know. He came back in here about a half an hour ago, looking all upset, and started drawing in the corner over there. Twenty minutes later, someone knocked at his door. I kinda fell asleep then, so I don't know what happened, but ever since then he's been gone. I thought he had just left to see you." Blair looked a little concerned, but was rapidly falling asleep as she spoke.
Maka glanced around the room, her eyes falling on the chest under Crona's bed where he kept all of his belongings. Pulling it out, she found that his sketchbook was missing. Since Crona almost never let his sketchbook leave his room, and he always put it back away when he was finished, Maka found this development worrying. The only two options that were open at this point were that Crona had either left his drawing paper in his room somewhere, or he had taken it with him wherever he had gone. As she couldn't see the book anywhere in his painfully bare and neat room, he must have taken it with him.
She left Blair snoozing on Crona's bed, walking on up the stairs as she brainstormed on what to do next. Maka was so lost in thought that she walked straight into Professor Stein, the mad scientist pacing agitatedly on the stairwell spinning his giant screw tight as he stared at his clipboard. "This doesn't make any sense!" he muttered to himself, not appearing to notice Maka at all, even though she had just bumped into him. "If only I could dissect Lord Death, then maybe I could figure this out…"
"Hello, Professor."
"Hm? Oh. Good evening, Maka." Stein seemed highly distracted, eyes darting back to his clipboard.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm just fine." Stein's mind was definitely somewhere else, his gray eyes snapping back to her as she coughed politely. "Oh, I'm sorry. What were we talking about?"
Should she or shouldn't she? Maka decided to try a dirty trick of Soul's. "The results there." She pointed to the clipboard that had him so agitated, Stein looking slightly skeptical.
"Really? Hm. I need to pay more attention to what I say; I don't seem to remember our conversation at all." He shrugged. "In any case, to sum it up, Lord Death has apparently caught the common cold."
"Why are you so upset? That shouldn't be too bad."
Stein tapped his clipboard. "But the problem is, shinigami can't get viruses like the common cold, it's just not possible. They have special enzymes in their blood that protects them against small bugs."
Maka frowned, seeing the quandary. "How is he?"
Stein grinned, pulling a cigarette out of a pocket. "Grumpy."
She winced sympathetically. "That bad, huh?"
"Yup. But I simply cannot understand how his immune system failed. Even the weakest shinigami should be able to hold off common illnesses, and Lord Death is in his prime!"
"Maka?" Soul clomped down the stairs, pausing to give Professor Stein a half salute. "'Sup, Professor?"
"Good evening, Soul." Stein turned back to Maka and whispered into her ear, "Remember not to spread this around the school. It would actually be appreciated if you didn't even share this information with Soul or your other friends." Leaning back, Stein spoke in his regular voice. "Oh, that reminds me. Have either of you seen Crona? Spirit wanted to talk to him, but I haven't been able to find the boy anywhere."
"Actually, I was looking for Crona myself." Maka said, looking at the floor.
"So was I." Soul admitted, making Maka look up at him in confusion. He caught her glance and shrugged. "I had asked him to go and talk to you, since you've been acting so uncool. I figured that he was probably hiding out in his room instead, so I was headed down there."
Maka nodded slowly, realizing that Soul was probably the reason that the timid teen had dared to venture out of the school in the first place. "He actually did come and talk with me, but I lost my temper and yelled at him. Crona ran off, and I've been trying to find him and apologize ever since."
"I'll go and ask Marie if he went to talk with her." Stein offered, striding off quickly.
"Let's go talk with the gang, see if any of them have seen him." Soul said, walking back up the stairs.
"Blair said that he was in his room at least ten minutes ago, and I noticed that his sketchbook is missing."
"So… what? You think he went off to draw something? And what the heck is Blair doing here at school? Doesn't she freak Crona out?"
Maka frowned and clenched her gloved fists, trying unsuccessfully to quell the resurging sense of jealousy against the cat. "I don't know, but that is definitely something I plan on asking Crona when we find him."
Ragnaroc's POV
Ragnaroc was going out of his mind with worry, seeing as both Crona and Rude were unconscious and not looking as though they were going to wake up any time soon. At the moment he was more concerned with Rude than Crona, since Crona had been strangled until he lost consciousness, which meant that Spirit didn't want the Maister dead. Rude on the other hand had just suddenly collapsed about ten minutes after Crona had passed out, which didn't make any sense since both Ragnarocs were inside their mind room which was somewhere that seemed like it would be safe.
Ragnaroc had lightly slapped Rude's face, shaken him, and had even held him up by his ankles and bounced around, but Rude was stubbornly persevering in staying unconscious. Finally, Ragnaroc gave up and picked the shorter boy up, carrying him into his room. Usually, for whatever reason, Ragnaroc wasn't able to enter 'Rude's' room even though technically it was his room too, but through reluctant {on Rude's side} experimentation they had found that when they were in indirect contact with each other Ragnaroc was able to join Rude in his room. Ragnaroc gently set Rude down on the red-sheeted bed, the shorter boy's comical head lolling back onto the soft black pillows.
He tugged his white gloves off, stuffing them in a pocket. Anytime that Ragnaroc touched Rude, they made sure to not let their skin touch; otherwise they would be forced to share the other's memories.
The room was pretty big and well lit; several lamps and dragon-shaped nightlights aiding the overhead ceiling fan, which only gave off a dim glow. An over-stuffed hamper was stuffed in a corner, the mound of red, black and grey clothes barely contained in the black plastic bin. A dark wood desk sat to the right of the clothes hamper, a large mass of magazines, books, weapons, and even a few collars piled on the table's surface. Beside the door, a large chest of drawers had been set against the wall, several silver and wood dragon figurines placed carefully on the smooth top, their images reflected in the large black-framed mirror that hung directly above the chest of drawers. Large paintings of dark woodland scenes, dragons, and sword-bearing heroes dotted his grey painted walls, while various weapons and magazines littered his black-carpeted floor.
All in all, Ragnaroc had to admit that it was really nice to be back in his old room. Rude had only let him back in about three times over the past ten or eleven years, but this place still looked exactly the same as it had when he wasn't stuck inside his young Maister's head. Ragnaroc smirked, thinking that the way it looked was like a dump. However, that wasn't entirely Rude's fault, since everything basically went flying back to the spot that it had been removed from when one of the Ragnaroc's weren't touching them after about a five-minute delay.
Plopping back into the black leather upholstered chair, Ragnaroc swiveled to poke through the mess of books and magazines, pulling out 'Eragon' by Christopher Paolini. Now there was a book that he enjoyed, {which was pretty obvious by all of the dog-eared pages}, the quick-moving plot full of magic, sword-fights, hot girls, and, of course, dragons. Flipping through the book that he already practically knew by memory, it suddenly occurred to him that it didn't make any sense for him to enjoy reading about magic as much as he did, since magic had basically destroyed his life. Ragnaroc frowned, feeling that there was something there just barely out of his mental reach, knowing that he could almost remember what it was…
THUD! Ragnaroc jumped to his feet and spun, only to see that Rude had somehow managed to fall off of the bed, smash into the bedside table, knock a few of the small silver dragon figurines onto himself, and still somehow stay unconscious. Sighing and shaking his head with a soft smile, Ragnaroc picked the shorter boy up and set him back in the center of the bed again, flopping back onto his bed with a second sigh. Staring up at the ceiling, Ragnaroc cracked up as he caught sight of a few pages from dirty magazines that he remembered tacking up a long time ago, the thought crossing his mind that if Crona ever caught sight of these he would probably go into a panic attack. "And yet they're in the poor kid's head. Oh, the irony."
Ragnaroc relaxed for a few moments, wondering if there were any differences in his room since it had become Rude's. His mind drifted, going back to a memory that he had recently remembered.
"Told you, that's my room."
Ragnaroc winced as he got back up to his feet, glaring at the comical figure."No, it's mine!"
"Oh yeah?" Rude didn't look convinced, folding his arms and glaring right back."Prove it!"
Ragnaroc scowled, thinking. "Well, behind the door there should be a chest of drawers, right?"
Rude smirked nastily, x eyes closing momentarily in pain as Crona convulsed on the table with a soft moan. "For that being your room, you don't sound so sure of yourself." He sighed, eye cracking open to fix Ragnaroc with a reluctant gaze. "But yeah, there is."
"The third drawer has a fake back, where I keep all of my most prized memories."
Ragnaroc pulled himself up, walking over to the chest of drawers and opening the third drawer. A few half-folded shirts had been crammed in haphazardly, along with a crumpled pair of boxers and an iron dagger. Digging past them, he pushed a slight depression in the top left corner, a door sliding open in the back of the drawer as he did so. Ragnaroc reached in and pulled out a small wooden box, iron and silver swirling through the dark wood in the shapes of dragons.
The first thing in the box was a very clumsy drawing of three figures; a short purple-headed blob, a tall black and red stick figure, and a short, long black scribble. Ragnaroc smirked at Crona's early handiwork, the lines highly inexperienced. He smiled sadly as he pulled a small bag full of lumps of colored glass out of the box next. Ragnaroc's hand clenched tightly around the plastic, tears welling up in his eyes as his thumb ran over the smooth clumps.
"Ragnerrock! Com'ere, com'ere!" Ragnaroc trotted over to where Crona was standing, the little boy's cries alarming the teen. "Whazzat?"
Ragnaroc smiled at the toddler before ruffling his pale violet hair. "Dude, that's a branch."
"B-but it looks like a snake!"
Ragnaroc picked the large stick up and showed it to the cringing toddler. "That doesn't mean it's not a branch. Here."
Crona backed up, arms waving wildly. "No, no! You always tell me not to touch snakes 'cause they're dang-ier-ously."
"Dangerous. And you shouldn't. But this isn't a snake." Ragnaroc internally smirked, then gave the little boy the saddest expression he could. "Don't you trust me, Crona?"
Crona's pale silver eyes widened as he bit his lip, the younger boy looking torn. "'Course, but-"
Ragnaroc spoke over his young Maister. "Good. Now, take it and deal with your fear."
Crona started to object again, then his entire body just… sagged. "O-okay." He reached out one trembling hand, pale fingers wrapping tremulously around the rough bark. Ragnaroc watched as his large silver eyes slowly darkened to a dark blackish-grey momentarily as Crona realized that the feared object really wasn't a snake, then they lightened to a cheerful silvery-blue. "Look Ragnerrock! I'm holding a snakey-stick!"
Ragnaroc smirked openly, pulling the boy into a headlock and giving his Maister a light noogie."Ragnerrock, dat hurts! Stoppit!"
He released Crona, who immediately took off running down the sandy shores. "Hey, Crona!"
The boy stopped and looked back. "Yeah?"
"Don't go in the water unless I'm there with you, got it, shrimp?"
"Yup! 'Kay!" Crona continued on his path beside the lapping water, giggling whenever the clear liquid washed over his toes. Ragnaroc spread a soft red blanket out on the sand, digging around in the canvas gym bag that he had brought with them. He winced as he pulled out a bottle of sunscreen, hating wearing the thick cream. With a heavy sigh, Ragnaroc called the toddler back over.
As Crona trotted over, Ragnaroc growled softly and squirted a generous glob of white paste into his hand and began to spread it over his exposed skin, trying to set a good example. "Here. Put some on." Crona obeyed, awkwardly smearing the gunk over his already pale skin. Ragnaroc finished applying white goo to Crona's back before he let the boy go back to his explorations.
Ragnaroc had started to doze, eyes shutting in contentment at the warm rays curling against his stomach, when Crona yelped in fright. "Ragnerrock! Ragnerrock!"
Ragnaroc was at the young boy's side in an instant, arm Shifting into its blade form. "What's wrong?"
Crona hid behind Ragnaroc's legs, one quivering finger pointing to where small bubbles were popping up from the watery sand. "The beach is breaving!"
Ragnaroc sighed in relief, chuckling at his little charge's fright. "Crona, there are small creatures that burrow under the sand to trap insects and stuff like that in their holes. That bubbling is just them breathing, or keeping the water out, I don't remember which." His brow furrowed in confusion as Crona's grip on his leg only tightened. "What's wrong?"
"There're creatures under the sand?" Crona's voice was terrified, Ragnaroc mentally kicking himself as he realized what was bothering the toddler. He knelt down, using the tip of his blade arm to dig up one of the holes, unearthing a tiny wriggling sea creature.
"Hold out your hands." Crona frowned but did so, storm-grey eyes worried. Ragnaroc tilted the blade, letting the sand and the small creature slide into Crona's cupped hands. "This is what they all look like." Crona yelped momentarily as the little crustacean squirmed and writhed in his palms, but he quickly became enamored with it, going on a search for more. Ragnaroc chuckled and shook his head, amused at how quickly Crona's emotions could change.
Eventually, after Crona had accumulated a small pile of crustaceans and Ragnaroc had taken a short nap in the rays of the chuckling sun, Ragnaroc taught Crona how to swim. Ragnaroc was slightly surprised when, after the first half hour of awkwardly wild splashing and yelping proclamations that he was drowning, Crona began to swim almost as well as Ragnaroc. And Ragnaroc could swim like a fish, so that was really saying something.
They swam around for a while, Ragnaroc finally getting out to dry off. He kept a cautious eye on the smaller boy as he began to pull their lunch out of the gym bag, setting the multiple containers out on the crimson fabric. "Hey, Crona! Come on and dry off before lunch!"
"Awww!" Crona gave Ragnaroc huge silver puppy dog eyes, a hint of a whine in the toddler's voice. "Can't I stay out a little longer, Ragnerrock?"
"Nope, but you can go back in later." Crona pouted cutely as he slowly headed back to shore, struggling to walk through the shallow water without falling over. Ragnaroc jumped to his feet and raced over as Crona screamed in terror, falling back into the water and thrashing helplessly. Ragnaroc grabbed the boy out of the two or three foot deep water and trotted back to the blanket, patting Crona's back as the toddler coughed up swallowed water.
"You okay?"
Crona buried his head in Ragnaroc's shoulder, shivering in fear. "There's something out there in the water, I saw it! It was black and scaly and sharp and scary …"
"Hey, hey, little dude. Calm down, it's okay." Ragnaroc wrapped him in a black towel, setting him on the blanket. "I'll go check it out, and if it's anything bad…" He Shifted his hand, showing the black blade to Crona. "I won't let anything bad happen to you, I promise." Ragnaroc patted the shaking toddler on his head before walking back out. He had a strong suspicion that what Crona had seen was going to end up being a large chunk of driftwood, but Ragnaroc didn't want to be wrong. Peering through the clouded waters, he finally caught sight of something moving in the water, something black momentarily breaking the surface before sinking back down. Ragnaroc let his left hand Shift, his right hand plunging down to grab whatever he had just seen. His questing fingers touched smooth scales, and he had to Shift his bladed left hand back to help him pull out a … light, black, scaly bundle of some sort of animal, Ragnaroc unable to distinguish what it was as it contorted weakly in his arms. Wading back to the boy on the blanket, he pulled out a second black towel, wrapping the odd creature up in the soft fabric.
After a few minutes of squeaks from both the bundle of cloth and a curious Crona, a black scaled head poked out tentatively from the folds of the towel, crimson eyes peering quizzically at both boys. A loud seagull screeched overhead, and the head instantly yanked back with a sharp yelp. "Whazzat?" Crona asked him, Ragnaroc shrugging as he slowly pulled the towel away from the creature.
"I don't know, but I'm gonna find out in a minute." With a final tug, the obsidian animal rolled out onto the blanket, squeaking in alarm as it scrambled to get back on its feet. Ragnaroc's eyes widened as they looked the creature over; a black-scaled lizard, dark clumps clinging to its back which now unfolded and flapped clumsilyto reveal that they were wings. "Oh, no way!" Ragnaroc began to grin, Crona tugging lightly on his shirt sleeve.
"What's going on?"
"Check it out, dude! I think that you found a baby dragon!"
Crona stared at the little dragon, about a foot in length and seven or eight inches tall. "Wow."
Ragnaroc took a slice of bread from their lunch, breaking it into smaller pieces and offering one to the dragon. It sniffed the limp bread for a while before grabbing it and gobbling it down in under a second. "Careful there, little one. Don't want you to choke."
"C-can I try?" Crona asked, looking hopefully up at Ragnaroc.
"Sure. Just be careful to keep your fingers out of the way." Ragnaroc gave Crona one of the slightly larger pieces of bread, making sure that the younger boy heeded his warning. Crona's eyes darkened from pale silver to the blue silver that showed that he was happy or relaxed as he watched the baby dragon munch the chunk that he had given it.
By the time that a half an hour had passed, the little dragon had begun to play with the two boys, prancing happily around in the sun. It quickly became apparent that it had imprinted on them, following them wherever they went. The dragon wasn't aggressive at all, its temperament apparently gentle. There was a short moment of stress when it proved that it could breathe fire, Crona unfortunately happening to have been in the path of the short burst of flame.
"Owww!" Ragnaroc comforted the sobbing boy as he cradled a slightly scorched finger, the skin a little red and apparently tender. The dragon was cowering behind the gym bag, having scurried there after Crona's loud cry of pain, but it began to slowly creep forward. Ragnaroc had a feeling that if the dragon had been a dog, its tail would have been tucked and its ears would have been flattened. It finally reached Ragnaroc's knee, letting out a soft whimper as it lightly pawed Crona's shorts.
"Crona, it looks like the little one wants to apologize." Crona didn't reply, turning his head into Ragnaroc's chest. "Come on, accept its apology."
Crona looked over at the baby dragon, the dragon's red eyes gazing back at him in worried carefully reached out, relaxing slightly as the baby dragon pushed its head against his hand. Ragnaroc smiled as the two made up, grinning as the dragon crawled up to sit on Crona's lap, who was sitting on his lap. Suddenly the little dragon scrambled to get off of Crona's lap, falling down onto the sand before letting a sharp flicker of crimson flame flare out of its mouth to the golden grains below. It let out a soft burp before padding back up onto Crona's lap, curling up like a contented cat. Ragnaroc blinked as he saw that where the flames had hit the sand, a shiny glob of scarlet glass had formed. He waited for a few minutes before picking up the still-hot blob, marveling at the smooth surface. "That's pretty, can I hold it?" Ragnaroc chuckled and handed the glass to Crona.
"Careful, it's hot." The boy nodded and let the small globule drop into the fabric of his shorts.
Over the next little while, they found out that different foods made the dragon produce different colored flames, all three having fun with that. Finally, it was time for them to head back to the mansion.
"Can we take it home with us?" Crona asked, both the toddler and the baby dragon giving him huge puppy dog eyes. "Pleeeeeeeease?"
Ragnaroc pretended to think about it, frowning and rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "I dunno… It doesn't even have a name." He knelt down to look the dragon in its red eyes. "What would we call this little one?"
"Why don't we call it the 'Little One'? That's what you've been calling it all day." Crona suggested, grinning as Ragnaroc ruffled his hair.
"All right, the Little One he shall be. Now I have two little ones in my life, what on earth am I supposed to do with you?"
"Give us a piggy-back ride home, please?" Ragnaroc groaned theatrically before nodding.
"Oh, all right. Up you go!" Crona picked up the newly-dubbed Little One and climbed up onto Ragnaroc's shoulders, whooping as Ragnaroc jumped to his feet. Ragnaroc laughed evilly as he grabbed Crona's legs and proceeded to shake and bounce around, Crona howling with laughter as he enjoyed the spastic ride.
Ragnaroc set the small bag back down, moving on to look at some photos when Rude moaned, making Ragnaroc jump somewhat guiltily and stick all of the objects back in the box, stuffing the box back into the hiding spot, and slamming the hiding spot and drawer shut. Trotting over to Rude's bed, he stuck a soft pillow under the comical boy's head. "What the hell happened to my head, you bastard?" Rude's words were slurred and almost unintelligible from pain, one ball hand slowly going up to his head.
"I don't know. I'm glad you're up though, I was starting to get worried."
"Fuck…" Ragnaroc watched worriedly as Rude sat up groggily, looking half out of it as he staggered over to the door. Ragnaroc hurried over to support him as Rude almost fell.
"Dude, you need to go back to bed!"
Rude made a rude looking gesture in his direction, leaning heavily on Ragnaroc's shoulder. "My fucking head feels like someone took a damn sledgehammer to it..." Suddenly Ragnaroc felt Rude stiffen against him, x eyes flashing open wide. "Crona!" Rude scrambled forward, half-falling through the door that took him out into the physical world.
Ragnaroc's face drained as Rude was forced back into the room through the door, something that had never happened before. Rude always went out through the door, and he always came back in through the ceiling. He never came back in through the door or out through the ceiling, it just wasn't possible. Rude cursed loudly before staggering back through the door, the short figure managing to stay out this time.
The screen showing what Rude saw flashed on, catching Ragnaroc's attention. He frowned at the fact that Rude's vision was blurry and spotted, wishing that he knew how to get Rude to come back in and relax for a while before he passed out again.
Rude was sticking up out of Crona's chest, something that didn't happen very often because Crona wasn't able to see very well around Rude's head and upper torso, both boys having ended up preferring Rude to protrude from Crona's back where Rude could still move around comfortably and Crona could see clearly.
Crona was lying on a metal table, sturdy leather straps running across his ankles, thighs, wrists and stomach, upper arms and chest, and teen Maister didn't appear to be physically wounded and Rude hadn't had any injuries, but that was about the end of their good news. Crona was out cold and strapped to a table in a dark room, Rude was groggy and disoriented, and Ragnaroc was frustrated at his inability to do anything to help either of them.
A door in the room opened, the bright light flooding in making Rude wince, stars flashing in his eyes. When Rude managed to open his x eyes again, both he and Ragnaroc flinched at the shock of seeing a tall figure that was standing in front of the table Crona was strapped to. A smaller flash of light reflected off of something metallic in the figure's hand, both Ragnaroc's watching as it sank into Rude's arm. As the screen went black, Ragnaroc saw the blurred figure nod in satisfaction.
Ragnaroc waited, but Rude didn't fall back into the mind room unconscious or otherwise, and now none of the screens were on. That was very rare, since the screen that showed Crona's thoughts usually showed his dreams whenever he was unconscious. Ragnaroc began to pace the length of the mind room, worried thoughts running through his mind…
Unknown's POV
The figure watched Ragnaroc sink into unconsciousness, the comical boy's figure slumping to fall against his Maister's. Walking over to a nearby table, the figure set down the hypodermic needle it had just sunk into Ragnaroc's arm. It smiled sadly as it flexed its fingers, dangerous-looking red sparks crackling from its palms. "Poor kids. Sleep well, both of you. Our appointed meeting hasn't quite come to fruition, but when it does I truly hope that you survive it." It rearranged Ragnaroc into a more comfortable position on both Maister and Weapon before leaving, the door slamming shut behind it.
