10. Nosebleeds
Rating: PG
Characters: Yuuri, Murata, Wolfram, Conrad, Gunter
"Still raining," Yuuri sighed as he and Murata walked out of the high school building, pulling up his hood. Murata, completely prepared as usual, had a huge, black umbrella. Yuuri eyed the umbrella suspiciously. "You aren't doing this, are you?"
"I am sad to report," Murata grinned, "That I, Muraken, your baseball manager…sadly cannot control the weather. Yet."
"Well what are you waiting for," Yuuri grumbled, shivering as a few drops of freezing water slid from his hair and down his neck. "You've had like thousands of years!"
Murata laughed and slapped Yuuri on the shoulder. "Let's cut through the park."
Yuuri was already soaked through by the time they were walking down the path, turned to mud in the downpour, when suddenly they heard shouts coming from down the path.
"Stop!" a girl was shrieking. "Give it back!"
Yanking back his useless hood so he could see, Yuuri dashed down the path, splashing up water on all sides.
Several meters down, two school girls were huddled together, their smart uniforms flattened by rain, while a third tried to get their umbrella back from a huge bully.
"Hey!" Yuuri shouted. " It's wrong to pick on defenseless girls, you thug! Give it back!"
The bully gave the girl a final shove backwards and turned to leer at Yuuri.
"And just what," he asked with an ugly smile, "is a runt like you going to do about it?"
"It is my duty as…" Yuuri paused as Murata came jogging up, giving him a warning head shake. "Oh, wrong world. Um…well…I'll tell your mother?"
The bully let out a laugh that made Yuuri's teeth rattle and slapped his leg.
"I'll tell you what," he chortled, "you can have this back if you can fight me for it."
"What!" Yuuri looked up at the bully looming over him, then over his shoulder at Murata for help. Murata, who was surrounded on all sides by wet school girls pressing against him underneath his umbrella, gave a little shrug. "Hey, just wait a minute…"
But the bully was already pulling his arm back and swinging forward a massive fist, which caught Yuuri square in the nose and sent him flying backwards. He landed with a splash in a huge puddle, and as his head hit the ground, he felt like the whole world was spinning, and squeezed his eyes shut.
When he opened them, the sky was clear and gloriously blue.
"Hey, it stopped raining," he mumbled, then winced when the movement made his face ache.
"What the hell are you doing here, wimp?"
Yuuri leaned up on his elbows gingerly to find a shirtless and damp Wolfram peering down at him, towel slung over one shoulder. Swallowing hard, Yuuri looked away and saw he was on the shore of river.
"You're covered in mud," Wolfram rolled his eyes as he leaned down to inspect Yuuri. "And you…your nose!"
"Wha?" Yuuri blinked as Wolfram knelt down beside him and pulled the towel from his shoulder to press to Yuuri's face. He looked down to see a pinkish splotch spreading across the towel.
"You're bleeding, idiot," Wolfram said, but his voice wasn't as gruff as usual. "What were you even doing in that stupid world of yours?"
"Dere was a buwy," Yuuri said thickly through the towel. "He stole dese gi—ah, these kids' umbrewa, and I was trying to ged it back, and then he punched me and I fehw in a puddle."
Wolfram grumbled something inaudible as he pulled the towel away and inspected Yuuri's nose. "The bleeding's stopping. I don't think it's broken, but you're going to look like Randolph the Purple-Nosed Bearbee for a few days."
"Great," Yuuri sighed, then suddenly sneezed, and the bleeding started all over again.
"Oh, Yuuri," Wolfram sighed, reaching for him. Just then, there was a ruckus in the woods behind them.
"Here he is!" Conrad called, yelling over his shoulder. "And the Maou is back!"
"Your majesty!" Gunter howled joyfully, coming over the rise to rush at Yuuri. He stopped short and looked from the shirtless Wolfram to the Yuuri with blood streaming from his nose, then let out a wail. "His majesty is too young for that!" he sobbed.
"What the…" Yuuri glanced up at Wolfram to ask, but found Wolfram suddenly bright red.
"Idiot," Wolfram snapped, shuffling away from Yuuri quickly.
"What is going on here?" Conrad inquired as he joined them.
"Nothing!" Wolfram exclaimed, stalking off. "He got punched in the face!"
Conrad tried to hide his laughter as he helped the thoroughly confused Maou to his feet, but it was something of a complete failure.
