Chapter 35

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN THE GOD EATER FRANCHISE HOWEVER I DO OWN MY OC.

Name: Cedrick Esparza

Gender: Male

Hairstyle: Style 7 (Dark Brown)

God Arc: Burning Maiden (Short Blade), Apega Blaze (Sniper Rifle), Kurogane Tower (Shield)

Blood Art: ?

"Hello, Cedrick. It's been a while."

I halt in surprise as my visitor greets me with a smile before pulling me towards him in his arms.

"It's been a while." He repeats before grinding his knuckles on my head as a form of affection. I gently push him away to get him to stop before taking in his changed appearance. His messy hair had changed from an extravagant green to a bright blue. His facial features remained the same but his hair had grown long enough to almost cover the right side of his face. To match his blue hair, he still had his customised, murky blue lab coat. Underneath that he sported a black t-shirt and jeans.

"Well look at that, it appears I've shocked him shy." He remarks with a smirk as his head angles behind him. I follow his gaze to see the Director in his seat, watching the scene with a smile of his own. Getting over my initial surprise, I pick up my mouth from the slack position that it went into, without my knowing, and speak.

"Uncle?" The surprise was still evident in my voice. After all, it displayed my feelings at the minute. Never would I have thought that I'd see my Uncle here.

"That's right. You didn't forget about me did you?" He may have said it as a joke but I know what he means by this. "After all, you haven't contacted me at all since you've become a God Eater." He comments with a smile on his face. To be honest, I had completely forgotten to contact him at all because of everything that has been going on. Usually, when your life is on the line as a God Eater, you don't have time to mull over things and thus, your life and the life of those you work with are all you care to acknowledge.

"I've been busy." I have the nerve to say with a sheepish expression. He doesn't need to know that I had completely forgotten about my past until Julius brought it up earlier. It's almost as if I've been a God Eater all of my life.

"Yeah, I know you have." He speaks happily, sounding as though he has forgiven me. "But now that you've settled in, I'll expect you to give me regular calls." I give a nod in response before a question that had been lingering on my mind since I first saw him escapes my lips.

"Why are you here?" It is only after I say the question that I realise how unwelcoming it is. Still though, he knows I would be curious as to his intentions for being here.

"Well, I'm here on business." He speaks confidently with his hands in his lab coat. "I'm an old friend of Director Sakaki." My Uncle gives a flick of his head in the Director's direction. "I didn't even know you were here until just recently. You know, since you haven't contacted me." He chuckles lightly at the end of his sentence.

"So how did you know I was here?" Again, I may have sounded harsh but I did want an answer.

"Ah, well the Captain of your unit was already in here when I came in." My Uncle begins. I'm conscious of the fact that Director Sakaki is listening by his whispered contribution of, "Strolled in more like it. I see where Cedrick gets it from." Regardless, my Uncle continues,

"I heard him speaking about Vice Captain Esparza." He speaks as though he is full of pride. To add to the effect, he wipes a mock tear from his eye. "Having the surname of 'Esparza' and also happening to be in the Blood Unit, well it can't just be a coincidence." He explains. I guess now it makes sense why Julius had asked about my family. He must have wanted to know more about my Uncle. "By the way, Cedrick," He speaks as he approaches me, placing a hand on my shoulder. "Is this some sort of fashion statement?" His free hand plays with the support of my eye patch before he removes it from my head completely. I widen my eyes in surprise at the gesture.

"What happened to your eye?" He asks in concern. I hadn't realised that by widening my eyes in surprise, I had revealed the ugly, fake eye I had. I raised my left hand to cover it before using my right to take my eye patch back.

"I'll field this one, Cedrick." Director Sakaki speaks whilst I put my eye patch back on. "You see, Lucio," He address my Uncle by his given name, "Cedrick required a process called enucleation in order to save his vision." I see my Uncle flinch at the use of his name and I recall that he never appreciated it.

"I see." He connects the unspoken pieces together and appears to mull over it before dropping the subject. Glancing at his face, it seems as though he wants more information on the subject. I don't know why he dropped it then.

"Well, I should be getting back to Headquarters." he says whilst stretching out his legs. "Cedrick," I flinch slightly as I don't expect him to call me by my name. "I'll expect to hear from you in a few days." Was that it?

"Yeah, okay. I'll speak to you then." I reply with a positive voice. I mean, of course I am sad that he can't stay a while longer but now I can remember to contact him. With my final words to him, I leave the Director's Office and had back into the lounge where I can relax more; and maybe ask Julius about what my Uncle said to him.

Re-entering the Den, I happen to overhear part of a conversation.

"That was amazing! I never knew you were so talented, Gil!" I look to my right to see Licca and Gilbert talking to each other near the piano. I head over to inspect what Gil's new talent is.

"What did he do?" I ask in an amused voice. It seems that Gilbert is not used to the appraisal.

"It's nothing. No big deal." Gilbert comments, turning away with what looks to be a hint of red in his cheeks.

"It's a giant deal! He asked me to show him how to make a Resonance Wave receptor, right?" Licca asks and I nod my head in confirmation. "So I did. It's complex. And as soon as I was done, bam! He just makes one! All by himself!" Licca sounded genuinely pleased despite the fact that her words are a little patronising.

"A man of many talents, eh?" I look at him as I tease him a bit. He seems more than happy to give a retort.

"It was more of a fluke than anything. I'm lucky Licca's such a great teacher." I get his game. He's trying to turn the embarrassment onto Licca.

"Hey, if you can make one without me, I'm psyched. We may have a future engineer here!" His attempt had failed as Licca speaks confidently. Although, he did manage to change the subject slightly.

"In any case, now that I can build a receptor, I think I can figure out how to build more. Here is the receptor I made." He hands me some sort of machine which I now know to be the receptor he was speaking of. I give it a look over as Gilbert continues to speak. "The Mark 1. I... I want you to have it." He sounds so unlike himself at the minute. I guess this is what a shy Gilbert is like. "Hopefully you can use it to make a pretty powerful God Arc."

"Thanks, Gil. I'll see what I can do with it right now." I comment before giving the duo my farewells and heading to my room to store the receptor and see what I can use it for.

The next day, after asking Licca to upgrade my Arc and changing it to a Boost Hammer, I received quite the shock from Romeo.

"Hey, Vice Captain." He greets me in his usual vibrant way. "I've scheduled a mission for us, Ciel and Nana. Get your things ready. We'll be going to the Sunken Grid for this mission." He informs me before leaving which leaves me shocked at the fact that Romeo would set up a mission for us. I do as he says and stock up on Restore Pills before heading back to see Licca.

"Hi, Licca." I greet her happily for the second time in an hour. It looks as though she is working on my Arc. I can see that it has been changed to a Boost Hammer.

"Cedrick? You're back early." She comments in surprise as she looks up from her work.

"Yeah, Romeo enlisted me onto a mission so I'll need my Arc." I inform her of the situation with a smile on my face. She gives no reaction which I find to be weird.

"If you can wait for another ten minutes, I will have upgraded your Boost Hammer." She speaks to my delight and I do, indeed, wait another ten minutes; holding a conversation as I do which probably made it take longer to upgrade.

"Okay team," Romeo begins, grabbing our attention before moving any further through the battlefield. We had been looking for the Aragami for a good five minutes at least.

"I think it would be easier to split into groups to find the Aragami." Romeo says this with so much positivity that I almost forget that we've been searching for five minutes already.

"That's a good idea." Ciel gives her comments. "I propose that Nana and Romeo go that way" She points in the direction she is talking about, "while the Vice Captain and I go this way." She points in the opposite direction.

"What?! I wanted to go with..." Romeo begins to protest but trails off, "right, we'll go this way. Come on, Nana." The two of them walk away, chatting whilst looking for the Aragami. I expect the same thing to happen with Ciel and I.

"Shall we be off?" She speaks and I give a nod before heading off with her leading us. Leaving me behind her with a nice view.

A short while later, Ciel and I happen to come across our target completely by mistake as it makes its presence known by running in front of us, seeing us and then attempting to escape. Despite how unusual it is for a beast of its size to run from us, even just an Aragami running from us before we can engage it, we follow it into a corner. The Aragami, a Borg Camlann I should add, seems to be continually backing itself into a corner as we move closer to it.

"Something is strange." Ciel stops advancing on the Borg Camlann but I continue on my path towards it. My slow footsteps as I approach it must make me appear a lot more threatening to the Aragami than if I were to end it quickly.

"The Borg Camlann should be in your area right now. It ran away before we could finish it off!" Romeo's voice comes through my earpiece. I guess that explains why the beast was backing into a corner. Ciel must have thought this too as I hear her footsteps from behind me. Suddenly feeling fed up with threatening it, I run towards it.

"Help me"

As I approach the beast, I am sure I hear a whisper but immediately deem it to be the wind making it seem as though there was a noise.

"Look out!" I hear Ciel's voice from behind me but I'm not sure what she is warning me of. I jump towards the beast's claws but it quickly spins around; it's tail missing me due to my jump but I hear Ciel shriek in surprise as the Borg Camlann's tail hits her. As I land, I make sure to roll underneath the beast to use my Arc in an uppercutting motion and making sure the beast can't get back up. I look in the direction the I assume my partner flew in after backing away from the dead monster. Not being able to locate her, I move closer to the area. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice that the monster doesn't seem to be disappearing. I disregard it, though I do make sure to look back every few seconds to make sure that the beast doesn't try to surprise me with a sneak attack.

"Ciel?!" I shout as I try to find her.

"Erm... Cedrick? Do you think you can help me out?" I hear her ask and, hearing that she didn't shout, I assume her to be close by.

"Yeah, okay." I'm not worried anymore. She didn't seem to be in a rush for my help.

As I turn a corner, I see Ciel's God Arc lying on the ground near the water surrounding the remains of the old power plant. I walk closer to it.

"Ciel?" I ask with a hint of concern, just to make sure she is in the area.

"Down here, Cedrick." I hear her voice from near the Arc. It sounded as though she had landed in the water. I peer over the edge to have a look. Standing there looking up back at me is Ciel. It looked as though she was standing in the water and it didn't look too deep. It looked to reach her shoulders so she wasn't in danger of drowning. What she was in danger of, though, was not being able to get out of the water. The area she is in is like a trench. While the water may not be deep, the drop into it seems to be. I get onto my stomach and try extending a hand towards her.

"Take my hand, Ciel." I instruct her. She tries to do it with a slosh as she wriggles closer to the wall of the trench to take it.

"It's no use. I can't reach it." She says as she still tries to reach my hand. I look around the trench to see if there was anything we could use to get Ciel out of the water. Alas, there is not.

"Dammit." I murmur before trying to extend my hand further into the trench, ignoring the pain in it. Unfortunately, I still couldn't reach her and my arm was still beginning to tire from the stretching. I pull back my arm and roll my shoulder a few times to try and minimise the pain. That's when an idea pops into my head. I smile as I enact it. I take off my upper clothing, exposing my skin to the bitter wind, and extend it into the trench.

"Grab this!" I instruct as I try to push more of the shirt towards her grasp. She stumbles a few times before she manages to reach it.

"I've got it!" She shouts and I attempt to pull her up. The combined weight of her and the water she is carrying in her clothes is enough to make my arms ache as I pull her out. Eventually, I manage to stand up with her almost out of the trench. I can feel my arms weakening though and I won't be able to keep pulling her out for much longer. With a final burst of strength and a rather audible grunt, I pull my arms behind my head and Ciel comes flying out of the trench. The bad thing is though, my arms are behind my head so I have nothing to stop Ciel from plummeting into me and knocking me down to the floor with her.

With an "ow" I open my eyes to see Ciel's face just inches from mine. My eyes open in surprise to match hers, having already widened as she was the first to notice our position. She is quite a heavy girl and the water, some of which drips off of her body, makes her even heavier. As water droplets drip onto my chest I feel my nipples hardening. This doesn't embarrass me as it embarrasses my partner. What does embarrass me, however, is that I can feel her cold, soft breasts pressed against me; and if her breasts are cold, and she can feel my nipples, that means I can feel hers as well.

"Erm... Ciel." I attempt to string together a sentence but the pressure on my chest as she realises why I'm speaking and tries to correct this as she stands up, makes her nipples press into me even more before completely lifting up from me as she stands. I see her turn away with a very shy face as I stand up as well, only now noticing that my upper clothing had ripped due to the stress it sustained.

"We should probably get back." and forget this ever happened, I thought to myself although I doubt we will forget. We just won't bring it back up. I look towards Ciel as I speak this, only to see the reason why I love boobs. The white fabric of her clothes sticking to her chest and accentuating her curves makes the blood rush to my lower area. What's more is that I can see -

"Are we interrupting something here?" I almost fall to the ground in surprise as Romeo speaks from behind me, having walked here the same way that I had to find Ciel with Nana at his side. The two of them have their eyebrows raised.

"No, don't worry about it." I dismiss his comments before taking the lead in this conversation, "We should call for our ride." I speak as I walk past the two of them as I call for Hibari.

I continue my walk as I explain to Hibari that we need to be picked up. As I do so, I notice something strange. Not only has the Borg Camlann not disappeared yet, there is a figure standing by it. Still too far away from it to see any details, I move closer to the figure.

"She's dead. I finished her." I hear from the figure as I continue moving closer. CRUNCH. I look below me to see that I had stood on a stone. I quickly look back to the figure to find her not there but instead retreating into the distance.

"What was that about?" Was my only thought as a helicopter approaches the area.