[Phase 1]

Note: The italic lettering featured later on means that Noodle is speaking in Japanese, but is still in English because I don't want to torture my readers (and myself.)

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"Del!" Noodle calls from her bedroom. "Del see!"

It's Friday night, late as always. After Russ has gone to bed, she likes to call upon Del, the ghost rapper that possesses her father figure. Noodle's pretty sure that there's more than just Del in Russel's body, but she hasn't gotten to meet the other spirits, if they're present. She thinks that Del talks about them at times, but she's not completely sure.

Del likes to detach his spirit from Russel's body at night, and oftentimes goes to spend time with Noodle when she's still awake. 2D had gone to bed hours ago, but Noodle had taken a long nap earlier that day and isn't even remotely tired yet.

Moments later, Del finally arrives in the girl's room. "Heya, pretty girl. Wotcha up to?" The ghostly man asks. He somehow props himself on the surface of the door frame, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Colour." She replies with a wide smile in his direction. Sure enough, the child is surrounded by crayons, papers, pencils, and markers. However, she appears to be writing music on the back of one of her colouring pages instead of actually colouring on it.

Weirdo.

"Yeah? Wha'd ya want me to see?" Del asks, obviously very amused by her antics.

"Oh, hai, ock-a-pus." The Japanese girl replies, sitting up and shuffling the papers around in search of the particular one she had mentioned.

"Octopus, yeah? That's reeeal cool." Del comments, walking over to her. Well, not really walking, his feet don't touch the ground. He's always floating at least an inch above the floor, but still chooses to give the illusion of walking. Upon arrival, the bluish entity sits on the floor next to her.

Once she finds said octopus page, she hands it off to Del, who looks at the page. Impressed, he says, "Woah, yo just gettin' better an' better at this kinda shit, girl! I like it!"

"Gift Del." She tells him, nodding at the page meaningfully. "Um, uh, Noodle give Del ock-a-pus."

"Oh, man, I can't take this!" He seems to be blushing at her, somehow. It's an odd sight, considering he's a ghost.

"Uh. Um." Noodle shakes her head. "It's just for you, so you have to take it, okay?" She's reverted back to using her Japanese, having given up on English for now. Luckily for Del, he can understand it; being a ghost does have its perks.

"Are ya real sure, Nood?" Del asks her with a grin. He doesn't receive gifts often. Probably because he's dead. But that doesn't mean he isn't still appreciative of them.

"Keep it. It's yours."* The girl replies with an urgent look in her eyes

Del is now grinning like an idiot. "Woah, girl, thanks a ton!" He exclaims. "I'll be sure to have ol' Russ hang it up on the wall in 'is room." He tells her.

"Very good. Your octopus deserves the very best place." There's a nod of approval from her.

"Right, well, whatchu workin on over there?" Del sets his octopus colouring page on the dresser, careful not to crumple it.

"It's a bit of music I came up with. Nothing special, really." Noodle answers the ghost, humming a bit. She's lying on her stomach, her legs kicking through the air.

"Yeah? I'm sure it's great. Is it just chords? Or like real lyrics?" Del presses, leaning over to try and get a glimpse of her project.

"Lyrics." She says, gazing down at her paper.

"Sing. I wanna hear."

"Hmm, okay." Noodle sits up.

(Note: she's singing the Japanese part in their song 'Faust'. I'm too lazy to type in the actual lyrics.)

She does so, a bit of a blush finding its way to her cheeks when she finishes.

Del's silent for a moment. "Tha-that's real nice, Nood. Real pretty."

She finds it surprising that there's no sarcasm in his voice.

"Thank you!" The young girl says with another smile.

"Okay, so, you're showin' this to the boys, right?" Del looks at her proudly, he's dang sure Russel would feel the same. The girl has a great voice, and the ghost still can't believe that she's only sung for him. They're missing out, he thinks with a shake of his head.

"Hmm, no good." She's decided to go to back to English. Noodle's afraid that if she goes back to using Japanese for too long, she'll forget all of the English wording she's learned over the past few months.

"Well, I'm not gonna force ya, but I still think ya should. Russ would love to hear you sing, I bet you."

"No, Toochee sing. Noodle play gui-tar." The kid reminds Del with a pointed look.

"Right, but, ahh, whatever. Russ is wakin' up, so I got to go in a sec'." Del's started flickering and is definitely more translucent than he had been.

"Love Del much." She blows the ghost a kiss.

He blows one back. "Love you too, girl, stay outta trouble. Let Russ know I love him, too."

"Bye-bye!" The guitarist says, frowning. She doesn't want him to go. She never does like it when her friend leaves, but it's unavoidable.

Standing up, she takes Del's picture off of the dresser and starts off to Russel's room.

Knocking on the door, she taps her foot while she waits.

Moments later, the door opens. "Hey, baby-girl. You have fun with Del?" He asks.

She isn't sure how he always knows when she's been playing with Del, but nods. He bends down to pick her up and she covers his face with kisses. "Del, uh, Del say loves Russel." She tells him, which makes him chuckle.

"Yeah? Nice of him." Russ pecks her forehead. "What's this picture here?"

"Ock-a-pus. Del present from Noodle." The girl replies. "Put on, uh, um. Put on Russel room wall, Del ask."

"Tha's real cool, baby," Russel agrees, "o'course I'll put it up there." He glances at the wall across from his bed. It's whitewashed, covered in suspicious-looking red splatters. There's lots of other pictures on the wall, courtesy of Noodle. Most of them are colouring pictures, but others are drawings of things mainly consisting of Russel, cats, and guitars. Noodle loves cats; they're tied with octopi as being her most favorite animal.

"Where you want it?" Russel asks, looking around on the wall for an empty spot.

"Del wall." Noodle points to a wall that has a yellowing picture of Russ' old gang before the drive-by.

"Yeah? Aight, baby-girl." He takes some tape from one of the drawers in his dresser after setting Noodle on the bed. Her feet don't quite touch the ground, yet, despite a very recent growth spurt.

Russ loves to look at her drawings, especially when he's feeling useless. It reminds him that he's still needed here and it's not time to be with his old gang just yet. He's not planning to leave her with the other two dumbarses, though he knows that they mean well. He wants to be there for his kid, and dying won't accomplish that.

The fact that she likes to give Del gifts makes him feel all warm and fuzzy inside. He's sure that part of that feeling is contributed to Del himself. The rapper always did like to receive presents, and why should that change even though he's dead?

"Ah! Good. Very!" Noodle chirps happily, a bright smile on her face.

"I think so, too. This one's probably one of your best ones yet, baby-girl," Russel admires it, having stepped back.

Beside the coloured-in octopus is written in her messy handwriting, "4 Del." The 'e' is backwards, as is the four. She hadn't remembered how to write the correct English letters to spell 'for' with, but she had recently learned to write the numbers from one to eight, and she had remembered that the number and word are pronounced the same way when speaking in English. Russ had taped her page next to the cracked photograph on the wall.

"Um. Happy. Happy Del. Good." She approves, stifling a yawn. It's getting on to be 03:00, now. "Lift Noodle?"

"Yeah, it makes Del real happy." Russel agrees, not having missed her yawn. He picks her back up, cradling her. "You're such a good girl, you know?" He asks, a small smile tugging at his lips.

"Hai, good Noodle." She rests her hand on his cheek, burying her face in the baggy shirt he's wearing for pyjamas. His arms are her most favorite out of all of her boys' arms. They're so strong, she knows, and nothing can ever get past them and hurt her.

"Sleepy, yeah?" He rests his head on hers. Russel sits down on his rocking chair.

"A sleep. Mu-doc, Toochee. A sleep, also." She tells him, her voice muffled. Russel's the only one of her boys who doesn't smell strongly of cigarettes. He had given up the constant habit when Noodle arrived, only having a smoke on occasion, usually when his nerves are way out of whack.

"They asleep, yeah. You should be, too, baby." He doesn't seem too upset, though. She's often awake late, he knows, mainly so she can give Del some company. Del would often get lonely in when he was still alive, especially at night when any sane person would be asleep. Anyhow, Noodle's never been a morning person, even when she does go to sleep at a normal hour. It seems to run in the family; Murdoc and 2D aren't morning people, either, both usually staying awake very late into the night. They would then sleep in until at least 12:00. Noodle could definitely do the same if Russel didn't make sure she was awake by 09:30. Oversleeping isn't healthy.

"Russel a sleep?" Noodle looks up at him with curiosity.

"I was, yeah. Guessin' that Del woke me up somehow." Russ replies.

"Hmm, oh." Noodle pats Russel's cheek.

He nods. "D'ya want me to get Mike?" He wonders, referring to her stuffed monkey.

"Hai, Mike." Her voice is quiet.

Standing up, Russ bends down to set her on the bed. Her eyelids are drooping as she sits there. The late hour is finally catching up to her, obviously.

"I'll be right back, baby." He turns to exit the room.

"Nn." She agrees, rubbing her eye roughly with a balled-up fist.

As she sits there alone, she looks over to the photograph of Russel and the gang he talks about often. She knows that Russ misses them lots. Somehow, she feels as if she misses them, too, though she'd never met them. She wishes she could have met the guys. Maybe Russel would be truly happy if they were alive. She sees Del as almost like a second brother, one who's very different. Everyone is special in their way, and Del's not an exception. She wishes she could hug him, though. He often looks as if he could use one.

"Here, baby." Russ has returned with Mike.

"Arigato." Noodle thanks, taking the animal from Russ gratefully.

"Mhm. What's bugging ya, girl?" He picks her back up again, lounging on his bed with the girl in his arms.

"Noodle, uh. . . Noodle miss Del. Russel-like." She answers, her words slurring together.

"I know. It's not fair that he ain't here, too, but I can't fix it. No one can but the big man up there, and I think he's forgotten 'bout me." Russel says sadly.

"Nn.." She sighs, putting her arms around the large man as best she can in a hug. "Noodle love Russel."

"I know, baby. Love you back." Russ rests his hand on her back, closing his eyes.

The two fall to sleep like that. Del returns to his ghost form and sits there watching over the two until morning. That sight's something special to him.

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Hey!

Hoo, boy, this chapter was tough to write. Not only that, it ended up being waay longer than I had expected it to be. I was running out of steam around around the 750 words point, but then I had a boost in my motivation and wrote at least another 1000. I had just started out with, 'I should do something with Del.' Then this monster of a chapter was born. I was sure not to hold back with the fluff. Fluff is good. But there's a bit of bittersweet to it, obviously, because Del. I'll definitely write more with him; character development is nice.

Sleep well, Russ! You deserve it.

Until next time,

Liz