A/N: A few days ago a review was posted for Chapter 35, but I haven't been able to actually read it because it refuses to show up in the list of reviews for Silence. It has become rather bothersome, so whoever posted that 'ghost' review, you're the current bane of my existence :P
Alice arrived home a bit earlier than she'd expected, Dakota held the foyer door open for her as she sensed that all four of her 'children' were together in the living room. She also detected the sound of Japanese being spoken, so she assumed that Rize, Kaneki or Tabitha were watching Netflix. Most likely it was Tabitha.
She chuckled to herself at her own thought, then decided to join them. Her remaining report could wait until later in the evening, right now, she wanted to relax before they ate dinner. (Kaneki had been given some of Issacs' now officially named 'G-Serum' pills, and knew better than to argue about it)
Pushing the doors open, she immediately noticed that Kaneki and Tabitha were watching an anime on Netflix, while Tobias and Rize were lounging on the wide couch, reading. One glance at Tobias revealed that despite not wearing a suit to cover them, he was wearing his holsters with his VP9's. 'Inseparable' was an understatement when it came to him and those pistols.
"Still have one report left to go through, but I said fuck it. Damn thing can wait until later." She announced as she strode inside the living room and sat in the armchair, finding it very warm as she sat down. Seems like Kaneki or Rize had been the last to sit in it. "Which of you two hotheads warmed up the chair for me? Feels good." She let out a sigh of satisfaction as she laid her head back and closed her eyes.
Rize silently raised one hand, still reading her book, her legs pulled up with her knees together as she laid on her side with one arm keeping her upper body at least somewhat upright by resting her jaw on her knuckles.
Tobias was laying on his back, his vibrant right arm resting behind his head while he held his book in his left - wearing his armour, of course - with one knee raised as a support. He looked over at her comment about the chair. "How'd you know she was sitting there earlier?"
"Warm isn't really the right word, but at least it's not burning me." Alice smiled slightly, but then her smile flickered when she recalled that Toby's face was still burnt. "Oh... shit, I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry, Toby!" She immediately apologized to him, but he just smiled.
"Why the fuck are you the one apologizing?" His gaze shifted to Kaneki for a moment. "Should I even get my hopes up, cyka?"
"If I knew what that word you kept calling me meant, I'd assume it's an insult." Kaneki remained in his laidback position, not rising to Toby's challenge. "But, no, not really." He answered with barely even a glance in Toby's direction.
Toby smiled, scoffing softly as he turned his gaze back to the pages of his book. "It means 'Bitch'."
"Boys..." Alice spoke in a warning tone, still with her eyes closed.
"Alright, Miss Abernathe..." Kaneki turned towards Alice, admittedly not willing to incur her wrath.
"Hmm..." Tobias gave no reaction beyond a small hum, his fingers drumming against the back of his head as he continued reading The Egg of The Black Goat. He was liking the dark theme quite nicely.
Despite the audio of the anime playing from the TV, the room was eerily quiet. Tabitha was curled up in the baggy mess of her trench coat, silently watching the screen. Yes, she was being quiet. Kaneki, with his left knee raised and his left wrist resting on his kneecap, was also watching the screen, trying to ignore the annoyingly delayed English subtitles at the bottom of the screen. Rize and Toby had their books, so the only sounds coming from them was when they turned a page.
Suddenly, an ear-splitting sharp crack broke the silence, startling both Alice and Tabitha to full awareness. Tobias had one of his VP9's out in an instant and Rize had a lit fireball when they realized that Kaneki was the only one that hadn't reacted.
"It was me." He said as he lifted his left hand, where he'd had the index finger pressed under his thumb. He switched his index with his middle finger, once again creating the incredibly loud cracking sound. "Sorry, they started to feel stiff."
"Jesus, how'd you get so stiff it sounded like a gunshot?" Alice asked, leaning forward to see his hand better. Out of the corner of her eye, she watched as Tobias slowly returned his pistol to the holster and resumed his relaxed pose with a noticeable frown on his face.
"It's never been that loud before... Sorry, I didn't mean to startle everyone like that." Kaneki lowered his hand back to his kneecap.
A moment later, there was a knock from the foyer, and Javier peeked inside. "Did something break? I heard a cracking sound."
"No, it was Kaneki cracking his knuckles." Alice shook her head. "No, I'm not kidding."
"Kaneki, sweetie, if you were human, I'd have suggested seeing a doctor about that... But since you're not, it's a bit redundant." Javier smiled before turning to Alice. "My apologies for interrupting."
"Don't worry, you weren't interrupting anything." Alice waved him off dismissively. He left, and after a moment of continued silence, she asked. "Are we all just gonna sit her in silence? It was more exciting in my office."
"I'm a bit obsessed with this new series, I was reading it before we moved in." Rize held up her book, which seemed to be the third volume, judging my the Roman numerals beneath the title. "Finally found time to read it today."
"Nothing interesting being aired on TV, so me and Kaneki started watching some anime." Tabitha extended her small hand through the blanket-like mess of her coat, holding the Wii's controller in her hand.
"And you just got home from work, obviously." Alice commented in Russian, to which Tobias nodded slowly with a glance in her direction. "Tired?"
"Not really, just been on my feet all day." Tobias replied in Russian, glancing upwards to stare at the TV when one of the male characters started screaming in pain after being struck in the groin by an angry female character's extremely dramatic punch. "Did she just... punch him in the balls?" He asked in English, unsure of what he'd just witnessed.
"He deserved it." Tabitha replied, since she could translate without the stupid subtitles. "I can't figure out how to remove the subtitles, they're lagging behind and it's annoying me."
"I know how, pass me the controller." Alice extended her hand as her Telekinetic eye began glowing to signify she just needed to see the controller to retrieve it from her.
After extracting it from the depths of her coat, Tabitha held out the device, and Alice's Telekinesis plucked it from her grasp, pausing and exiting the episode to tweak a few settings, then resuming the anime. "There, fixed it."
"Sure sucks to be the only one that can't understand that cartoon shit." Tobias commented as he returned his gaze to his book now that there was strictly Japanese audio and no subtitles - delayed or otherwise - for him to figure out what was being said.
"Okay, first of all, not a cartoon." Tabitha got defensive very suddenly. "Second, none of us understood what the two of you were saying just now. So you shouldn't really be complaining, Snowman!"
"I had enough problems learning English as it is - and still have trouble once in a while - so I don't think it'd be any different for me to try learning Japanese." Tobias smirked, remembering the painful experience of learning a new - and difficult - language at ten years old. "So I think I'll stick with complaining, thank you very much, and I'll save myself the embarrassment of fucking up the language if I tried to learn it."
Kaneki turned to Tabitha with a huge smartass grin on his face. "He's clearly a dubbed fan."
"And you clearly seem to forget the fact I'm wearing two pistols under my arms, smartass." Tobias commented darkly, to which Alice cleared her throat pointedly to make him stop.
"Boys, last warning." She spoke sternly. "Anymore of this, and I'll hang you both from the ceiling by your ankles and beat you around like pinatas."
"Oh, that sounds pleasant..." Rize commented sarcastically, looking up from her book to stare at the two pale haired boys. "If you two don't stop, I'm more than willing to help her do it too. You too, Tab?" She leaned to the side to see her little sister's expression change. "Want to make these two baka's into a pair of pinatas?"
"Good luck getting past my armour..." Tobias smirked, quickly coating himself in his glossy smooth layer of protection without moving from his relaxed position on the couch.
"Gimme enough time, and I'll be able to break it." Tabitha teased him by sticking out her tongue at his armour. "A lot of time and a really big stick works wonders."
Without missing a beat, Tobias retracted the ice covering his face, staring Rize straight in the face with a huge smartass grin, his tone absolutely dripping with sexual innuendo. "Damn right it does."
Without warning, he alone was hoisted into the air by his ankle, laughing at the shocked embarrassment on Rize's face for his jab. He twisted around to see that Alice wasn't very impressed by his dirty joke.
"I'm not apologizing for that." He was grinning from ear to ear. "I saw an absolutely golden opportunity and I freaking took it." He paused for a moment, dangling from the invisible restraint before switching to Russian to talk to himself quietly for a moment.
"Fucking worth it."