This is a bit of a detour, to try and see what various other personal problems might develop among those who lead the happy life of an exorcist. Not hugely relevant.

Just to clarify: Antonina is Russian and about Marie's age; 'Dris and Helle are miscellaneous and the same age, Kiki and Jeanne are French, twins, and a couple of years older than Daisya; Isaac is from the Austrian Empire, the descendant of Sephardic refugees, and younger than Kanda and older than Lenalee. They aren't really that relevant - I just put them in for a bit of variety - so it doesn't really matter that much anyway. Antonina's dialogue is also a bit more stilted than the others', because she was fairly old when she got recruited, and hadn't had much of an education in English or French at that point.

Speaking of which, the characters here probably speak English or French. Tiedoll is French, if I remember correctly, and French was the lingua franca at the time, but headquarters is in England, so he might have just taught Kanda and Daisya English. I'm just writing this assuming English is the main language, because why not.

Daisya stretched his arms up in the air, letting out a sigh. The lunch table was mostly empty, despite it being only a few minutes past noon. Even the adults' tables were pretty empty, with only a handful of exorcists and a dozen or so finders. They didn't really talk to the kids much, so they weren't much help, sitting on the opposite end of the hall. He figured some of them didn't like kids doing adult jobs, and doing them better, sticks-in-the-mud that a lot of grown-ups were. Or maybe they just felt weird treating kids like they could do stuff. Too much work, for grown-ups.

His parents always had the same problem, but the old man and Marie weren't too bad. Sure, Tiedoll cooed and got soppy, and Marie was barely a grown-up anyway, but sooner or later they didn't bother talking down to you. Well, Tiedoll did talk to you like you were a toddler, but he did that to Marie and the other grown-ups too.

Anyway, there weren't many people left who'd talk to him. Marie and the old man had been away for a while, off with the African branch. Marie's grandparents had lived out in the southeast, a while back. Good for them. But now there was nothing much to do but play solitaire, and stare at the ceiling. Sure, he could read or draw or practice singing or something, but without people it just wasn't interesting.

Funny. Back home, it was the people that were boring. Leading the same old lives in the same old shops, selling the same old toys to the same old tourists and sucking eggs at football. He'd beat all the kids a hundred times, and he could just about finish his siblings' complaints for them because they never changed. The different plants growing and dying, they were interesting enough. And the sea. And football was always fun, even when you were only playing against yourself.

But here, even if he didn't talk to anyone else, just Kanda would give him a good few years of different reactions and little secrets. He was already this fast-healing super strong kid who hunted demons in his spare time. That was sick. Marie used even boring, slow old music like a weapon, and Lenalee had the coolest shoes he'd ever seen. Even after a year with the old man, he still hadn't learned anything about him. Lots about music, though. Reading, writing, and he'd already had a good grasp on 'rithmetic and languages.

So, he had plenty of stuff he could do, but it was nothing compared to the people.

"Say, Lenalee…" he started, just to break the silence.

"Yes?"

"D'you know where Antonina and everyone else went? There's no one here anymore," he moaned, putting his head in his hands, "It's so boring."

Lenalee looked up from her book.

"She's gone to Murmansk with Helle, I think. And my brother just told me this morning that Isaac and 'Dris got a mission in Sarajevo, so they were off before sunrise."

Daisya closed his eyes momentarily, as if reading something off of his eyelids.

"Murmansk," he muttered, "That's pretty far up north, innit?"

"It's in Russia," volunteered Lenalee, "I don't know how north it is."

"Eh, that's north enough," Daisya concluded, "I gotta say, I'm happy it's those two going instead of me."

"You don't like the cold? But didn't you like snow?"

Lenalee folded her arms on the table, and tilted her head sideways. She tended to do that when she was confused, though Daisya wasn't sure if it was on purpose or not. While she did seem to be a bit less innocent than you'd think, she looked pretty wide-eyed with those pigtails. After what he'd seen…well, he couldn't really blame her for getting angry. Even if she did get a bit heated about the Order.

He remembered when he'd been her age, and he didn't want to.

"Oh, yeah, I like snow, but I'm just not used to the cold. We didn't ever have a real winter back home. Didn't even get snow," Daisya complained, "I haven't had a full-on winter yet, but I don't think I'd last too long. You? You seem pretty used to stuff around here."

Looking for something to pass the time, Daisya scanned the lunch tray, picked up a knife, and started to carve something into an apple.

"We're mostly used to winter, here. My brother says it was pretty warm back home, but I can't really remember anything before I came to the Order. I think Antonina's from White Russia or somewhere, and Helle's from Norway, so they should be fine."

"That make sense," mused Daisya, trying to move the knife in a clean circle, "Aaargh, I just wish the spinny lady didn't send everyone away at the same time. It's so boring when no one's around."

"Well, there's me. And Kanda. You don't really talk to the others, don't you?"

Lenalee had tilted her head again, so Daisya shrugged.

"Hey, I talk to Isaac and Jeanne, even if they don't make sense half the time. It's just that I can hear them all when they're telling stories. It's a lot less boring than just sitting and doing nothing when you guys and Marie are away."

Lenalee paused, then nodded.

"But you should at least try talking with the others. They're really nice, once you get to know them."

Daisya grinned wryly, and raised a finger.

"Maybe, but for one, it's hard not to be nice to you. And secondly," he added, raising another finger, "You said Kanda was nice, so I think I'll steer clear for now."

"He just doesn't like to be bothered, that's all."

How in God's name this tiny little girl managed to get Kanda to soften up, Daisya didn't know, but he didn't want to find out. There was definitely some sort of black magic going on with that.

"Yeah, I can tell. Even old Marie's more social than him."

"Marie's really nice, too. My brother says he's just a bit shy."

"You can say that again," Daisya added in a low voice, quickly looking over his shoulder to make sure it was just the two of them in earshot, "Don't tell him I said that. I sorta owe him for accidentally knocking him out once. He's really nice, I agree."

"Don't say it if you don't want him to hear it," reprimanded Lenalee, "He taught me how to play the flute a bit."

"Did he? I guess he really likes his music."

"Yes, he does. He can't see, so music is probably like paintings to him. Or sunrises."

Daisya nodded, and pictured both, then imagined the feeling without being able to see.

"Maybe."

He tried to picture something that stuck in the memory a bit more. Explosions over the harbour. Flames in the inn. Kanda's glare in the half-light of the forest. Marie in a spider's web of silver strings. Lenalee blazing green.

"Yeah, that makes sense."

…

A lively mazurka faded out, the last strains of it flying above the arched corridors of the main hall. Following that, there was the faint scraping of a bench on wood floors, and the closing of a heavy door.

"Okay, that's seven no trump," Daisya figured, "So, two hundred and twenty points. Negative one hundred and forty plus two hundre–"

"It's sixty."

"Okay, sixty points."

Daisya scribbled down the number, and turned back to face Marie.

"Lenalee's turn to deal, I think."

Kanda had already passed the cards over.

"Can I leave now?" he asked sullenly.

"Only if you want to," replied Marie, almost teasing.

"Oh, I want to. Lenalee?"

"My brother wants me to help with some paperwork."

The two stood, Kanda striding off towards the dojo and Lenalee scurrying towards the staircase. Everyone knew that "paperwork" was code for "tea party," and had all agreed that Lenalee was too cute to stop.

A few seconds later, there was a brief flurry of sound when Lenalee nearly collided with another exorcist on their way down. Apologies were exchanged, and the other girl headed towards the players.

"Antonina?" called Marie, who seemed to perk up at the sound of heavy footsteps, "Would you like to join?"

"Of course."

The tall, rough-looking girl strode over to the group, and sat down beside Marie.

Marie dealt cards in a square, with a group three at its centre, after which all players picked up, ordered, and considered. The process repeated itself over and over again in the dining hall, with the players switching out, games ending, high fives being alternately exchanged and ignored. Sometimes it was Jeanne and Kiki against Isaac and Idris, sometimes Helle and Antonina against Lenalee and Daisya, but mostly it was any combination of the exorcists not on missions who knew how to play. Finders and grown-ups didn't normally join in, and played a more complicated game in their own corner of the dining hall.

This new game, for its part, featured Marie and Daisya against Antonina and Kiki. An interesting combination - Daisya was new and unpredictable, and seemed to like huge losses or wins over careful games. Marie was the opposite, and normally ended up with a slim victory on a low bid. Antonina, for her part, never paid much attention, and played aggressively when she had a good hand. Kiki was the most challenging opponent. Her silence ensured she was difficult to read, but her quiet observance of everyone in the Order, not to mention a couple of years of trying to deal with Antonina's moods, had ended up with her being able to read you like a book. She played differently depending on the set-up, rather than choosing a style.

Really, why she followed Antonina around like a lost puppy, Daisya had no idea. Maybe she was just a glutton for punishment, or maybe she took pity on the girl. He imagined Antonina could give some pretty good lessons on bareknuckle boxing, from what he'd seen down in training, so there was always that. Or maybe…

He reluctantly tore his mind from whatever wonderland it had wandered off to, and stared at his own cards, biting a lip as he watched Antonina rearrange hers across from him. It was always a bit weird, watching her play. Her hair was at least four, four and a half feet long on a good day, coarse and knotted, and trailed over her shoulders and on to the table. But that was all fine. It was when it started moving and writhing on its own that Daisya's skin crawled.

Antonina's Innocence was a parasite-type, which was all fine and well, but she always kept it partially activated, too. He didn't know how she could do it. She loved to play piano, which might have been why she used it so much, because it gave her the ability to play tougher pieces, probably. From what Marie had said, she also liked to play duets by herself, with the snake-like strands of her active Innocence acting as the secondo. The strains of music that flowed out over the cafeteria were hers, Daisya would find out.

And now her Innocence plucked cards out from her hand and placed them back, presumably ordering them by suit. Beside Daisya, the ash-blonde Kiki ordered here by a more conventional method.

"Pass. I must say, there have been a lot of akuma in Russia recently," she commented with a light French accent, "Even Jeanne got paired up with some adults to go up there."

"Six hearts."

Daisya didn't have much else to contribute to the conversation. For all that she was a year or two older than him, Kiki seemed like she was born at age 35. Across from him, though she was staring intently at her cards, Antonina's hair lazily curled itself into a bun. A few of the strands braided themselves, tying the whole thing together, then deactivated. He had to admit, the scars where his hair used to be were not pretty, but ew.

"There is a lot of death, up there. I should not be surprised. Six no trump."

"Indeed," Marie said thoughtfully, "There's the cold, and the police beside that. Pass."

Antonina shrugged, and collected the cards in the centre.

"You are not wrong. I apologize, but you have also been given many missions. I have not heard you play quite so frequently."

"Akuma activity has increased. It hasn't been regular for the last while, oddly."

"You should keep playing, regardless. Your Innocence is a gift. It is music."

A strand of Antonina's hair curled around, then laid down an ace of diamonds, and her accent thickened for a moment. From what he'd overheard Kiki saying to Lenalee, this happened when her control was loosening a bit.

"Both of you should," said Kiki diplomatically, "It's been a while since I heard your music too, Antonina."

She didn't once take her eyes off her cards, narrowing them slightly as she switched the position of two of them.

Kiki, the fine-featured French girl, had heard a lot of things. Daisya was pretty sure she could understand why Antonina's hair had uncurled and started writhing. She understood a lot of things, probably. If you sat by her for too long, you found yourself talking, and she would talk back, but her words wouldn't say much. He sometimes wondered if she had other powers besides being an Innocence accommodator. She was interesting, too, but harder to get at than Kanda. He was just angry. Kiki wasn't anything.

"No," a voice said bitterly, interrupting Daisya's thoughts, "It is not music. We can only try and make it. This Innocence does not create it."

Antonina held her cards using one arm, her Innocence curling down the other. Over the mangled stump of a wrist, it formed the outline of fingers.

"It cannot use the music as it should be played," she muttered, as if unaware that they could hear, "We are nothing that is music."

If you're wondering if this is going anywhere - not really. I just wanted to sketch out some of the people that Daisya, Kanda, Lenalee, and Marie might have known. Exorcists seem to die pretty quickly, if the manga is anything to go by, so all of them are probably dead by the time the series starts. Child safety doesn't seem to be on the Order's priority list, after all.