Chapter 11
When Rin and Miku arrived at Haku's store, the day after Dell's shocking death, they found that it was closed. Even though she wasn't particulary close with the deceased, Rin felt a sense of loss that this person she had grown accustomered to, had left this realm, completely out of the blue. At least with her mother, they knew death was drawing near, allowing her the chance to smile, as the last sparks of life evaporated away from her because she had fuffilled all of her wishes, leaving her with no more regrets.
Dell's end, on the other hand, was cruel and swift. He most likely wasn't able to acheive his goals and he had been so full of rage the last time she had encountered him. She felt that his soul wouldn't be able to properly rest, as his regrets would forever torment him.
He had been a jerk in life, sure, but Rin, after yesterday, couldn't picture him as a bad person. If Dell really were an awful person, then he wouldn't have been friends with Neru. Even Gakupo cared about him, despite the silver head despising his guts.
Rin understood that grief makes people do the wacky, so maybe that's why Dell had such an irritating attitude. His rudeness was his way of mourning for the person he had sworn his heart to. It didn't matter if his important person failed to return the same feelings, he had still loved her. That's what Rin believed, however, she would sadly never know the motivations behind Dell's personality.
Her reason for coming to this store was to offer her condolences to his sister. Even though Haku creeped her out immensly, she was still a human. A human who had permanetly lost something that was surely precious to her. Rin wanted to do her bit to assist, even if her help only brought about a teeny, tiny amount of comfort, it would be enough.
Miku also decided to tag along, even though she had never met Dell before. The teal head had informed Rin that her intention was to be a strong pillar of support and the blonde was glad to have Miku by her side, mainly because having Miku's lively energy will stop everything from becoming uber depressing.
"Hello, is anybody there?" Rin banged her fist against the locked door.
After knocking for a short while and receiving absolutely no response, Miku suggested, "Doesn't seem like anybody's here, so let's return home."
"Let's just try one last time," Rin replied, raising her clenched hand to the door. Before her flesh could strike wood, the door opened and Rin came face to face with an unfamiliar, blonde haired guy.
"We're closed, come again another day," the boy, who looked around Rin's age, told the girls.
"We're not interested in buying any of this weird stuff, we just want to see Haku. She knows who we are because we are regular customers here and this one was aquainted with Dell," Miku pointed at Rin. "So we've come to say our condolences"
Staring at them for a moment, he finally agreed, "Fine, come in," allowing the girls inside. "What are your names?"
"It's proper manners for the gentleman to state his name first," Miku calmly insisted, interupting Rin, just as she was just about to utter her own name.
Scrowling he answered, sarcasm evident in his tone, "Forgive me, my princess for my rudeness. My name is Akita Nero and will you now grace me with the honour of hearing your name?"
"Hatsune Miku," she curtsied and held out the back of her hand, expecting Nero to politely peck it. She pouted when he refused.
"I'm Kagamine Rin," revealed Rin, as she rolled her eyes, in both annoyance and amusement, at Miku's playful teasing. Huh? Akita...why does that name sound like I've heard it before? Wait, could he be...? "Are you related to Akita Neru?" she quizzed, once she remembered where she had first heard the name.
"Mm, yeah, Neru was my older sis," he nodded, as he lead the girls deeper into the store, where they ran into a young, green haired maiden, casually relaxing on a stool.
"Nero, who was at th-," she cut of her speech, immediately after taking a glance at the people trailing behind Nero. Her face broke into a grin and she flung herself at Rin, yelling out, "Len!"
Rin wasn't sure what she was more stunned about. The fact that this random stranger now had her arms tightly wrapped around her or that this girl apparently knew her twin. She was so focused on her thoughts that she missed seeing Miku flinch.
Pushing away the girl, who was in the midst of suffocating her, Rin grumbled, "I'm not Len. My name is Rin."
"Huh?" she used her green eyes to examine Rin. "Wow, I'm so sorry, I guess I just saw your head and instantly thought it looked identical to some guy I know. You really do look a lot like him, strange, isn't?"
"Not really. You mentioned Len, right? I have a twin brother who shares that name. Maybe the Len you know is the same one that I know?"
"Wait, you said you were Rin. Does that mean you are that Rin?" her eyes blowing up in size, as she questioned the blonde. Obtaining only a confused expression, the green head explained, "I'm Gumi, Gakupo's little sister. He's told me a lot about some chick called Rin. So, is it you?"
"...Probably."
"How do you know Len?" Miku shoved herself into the conversation, bringing back the earlier topic and Rin was surprised that her usual smile had disappeared.
"Actually, I don't really know him. I just briefly met him at Miki's birthday party. I haven't seen him since then," Gumi answered.
After the words sank inside her, Rin felt relieved and a bit perplexed. Relieved that her sighting of her brother was not a trick of the mind but perplexed because she couldn't think up any reason for him being at that party.
Hearing Nero's voice addressing her, Rin ended her Len musings and focused her ears on Nero's voice, "...follow me, I'll direct you to Haku."
Following after him, Rin heard Miku call out, in her sing-song chirp, "I'm gonna stay here and keep Gumi company."
"Okay," replied Rin, not stopping her steps. Eventually, she and Nero halted at a dark, indigo door.
Nero knocked and yelled out, "Haku, you have a guest."
"Come on in," a voice responded, from the other side of the door and Nero and Rin entered the room.
The room was pretty bare. It's walls were painted with the murky darkness of indigo giving the room a creepy vibe. Haku kneeled in front of low table and asked, "Can I offer you some tea?"
"Sure," Rin accepted, watching as Haku poured three cups of green tea, as the two blondes joined her at the table.
"Have you returned for some more supplies?" Haku asked, Looking at the silver haired woman, Rin was amazed that she seemed to be in the exact same condition that she had been when they had last met.
"No, I came here to tell you that I'm sorry about your loss," she gently murmured, taking a sip of her tea.
"There was no need to. It is what fate had planned for him. I will admit, I do feel some remorse at losing the final remnant of my family but I shall move on from this pain, with the guidance for my foxes. Thank you, for caring, I'm sure Dell would have appreciated it," Haku let out a minuscule smile and Rin was impressed by how strong Haku was. So impressed, that she no longer considered the mysterious woman weird, creepy and intimidating.
When the two, young women began strolling the path that would eventually lead them back to the brothel, a ball rolled in Miku's path, causing her to stumble but luckily, she managed not to land on her ass.
Picking the ball up, her teal eyes spotted a group of five kids all staring right at her. "I'll be right back, Rin Rin, so you just wait here," she instructed Rin, as she began marching towards the kids, wearing a devilishly, sweet smile on her face.
She's so immature, Rin thought. When she had first encountered Miku, that personality had annoyed her but it had always managed to lift up her spirits. Meeting Miku was one of the silver linings to the disgraceful job that she was now able to tolerate.
"I've been looking for you," a threatening, masculine voice came from behind Rin, as someone roughly grabbed a hold of her. Twisting her neck, she saw that the person who had assaulted her was Miku's client, Kiyoteru.
"Let go, you're hurting me," she moaned, her face wincing in pain, at the pressure being applied to her arms.
"You think this hurts? Real pain is having your wife disappear and taking your own fucking daughter with her! The only thing that selfish woman left behind was a tiny, pathetic note saying that she wouldn't be coming back! Now, because of you and that rest of that whorehouse, I've lost my family and I'm going to make you suffer just as much as I am!" Kiyoteru raged, his dark eyes behind his glasses shining murderously, forcing Rin's body to uncontrollably shiver in fear.
Suddenly, a ball smacked Kiyoteru across the face, causing his glasses to crash to the ground, just barely managing not to shatter into a million, mini pieces and his hands reflexively released Rin.
Once free, Rin spotted Miku standing a short distance away, her hands floating in the air, as she happily cheered, "Did you see that Rin Rin? My absolutely perfect bullseye!"
Bending down to retrieve his scratched glasses, Kiyoteru returned them to their rightful position and easily caught a hold of Rin again because the blonde was paralysed, thanks to all these rapidly occuring events, making her bewildered, as her brain's processing pace was unable to match the speed of what was happening around her.
"Kiyoteru, release her," Miku's voice shocked Rin because it was no longer her usual, sweet sounding high-pitched noise. Instead, her tone was hard and deadly and taking a glimpse at Miku's expression made Rin gulp, as there was zero trace of the joyful teen Rin had gotten to know, in these past weeks.
Stepping forward, towards the conflict, Miku resumed barking orders, "Let Rin go! I'm sorry that your wife found out what kind of a worthless piece of trash you are and dumped you but don't take it out on Rin. She had nothing to do with anything. If you want someone to punish, then you can have me."
"Interesting idea," Kiyoteru began pondering the thought in his head, glancing between the two girls. "If you promise that you won't try to escape, then I'll let the little runt go."
"Deal," she nodded, her teal head, without even the slightest hesitation.
Roughly tossing Rin aside, as if she was just a simple doll, Kiyoteru walked right up to Miku, gazed into her eyes filled with bravery and then slapped her cheek, the force making Miku lose her balance and tumble to the ground. Continuing his brutal attack, he began using the power of his feet to kick the lying Miku.
"Miku!" cried Rin, witnessing this terrible scene.
She was intending to interfere and hopefully help her friend when Miku managed to pant out, "Get...out of...h-here...R-Rin."
Rin was going to scream out her refusal to flee, when a familiar purple figure rushed past her.
With his sword drawn, Gakupo calmly commanded, "Kiyoteru, even if it's you, I won't hestitate to feed this blade your blood if you don't stop what you are doing, immediately."
"Tch, fine, you win," Kiyoteru gave Miku one last kick for good measure and began departing the area, without another word.
"Miku!" Rin cried, dashing towards the beat up teen and embracing her in a enormous hug.
"Ow, Rin, that hurts," she complained.
"I'm sorry," Rin apologized, letting go of her friend. "Thanks, Gakupo. Not only did you save me before but you also rescued Miku. There isn't enough words to express how grateful I am, so thanks."
"There's no need to thank me. I was just doing what any decent person would do," the samurai replied.
"No, Rin's right, so...thank you, Gakupo," Miku muttered, softly. Neither Rin nor Gakupo noticed the irritation that lay buried in Miku's grateful words. The irritation that she now owed her life to the person she detested.
A/N: Well I figured out an ending for this that I think goes well with the song this fic is based on. It will finish around chapter 17, more or less. Anyway, thanks for reading.