Disclaimer: I do not own DanMachi or any of the Omori's original characters, nor do I make any profit off of my writing.
Bell blinked owlishly down at the girl before him, who blinked owlishly up at him in return.
"Uhh.. honey?"
There was an echoed 'yeah?' from somewhere in the house behind him, bounding through the halls from the kitchen to where he stood in the entryway. Bell's fingers drummed idly over the doorframe as he stared down at the child before him.
"I thought we agreed on no more strays?"
The comment earned him a seven-year-old's glare but he couldn't be bothered to care. A puppy could look more threatening than this.
Ryuu peaked her head out from the kitchen, her brow furrowed as she met his gaze. "I haven't brought any in since last month?"
Well, that's good.
Bell had been getting real tired of potty training a million different kittens because his wife was incapable of ignoring them. As endearing as it was to see her walk through the front door with another bundle of fur, he was getting old and it simply wasn't sustainable to keep taking in more.
Still, it didn't explain the random-ass child sitting on his couch.
How did she even get in here? A quick check showed the front door was still very much locked.
"That's great, but who's she?"
He jabbed a thumb over to the child who'd yet to stop glaring at him.
Seriously, kid. Knock it off. You're not scaring anyone.
In truth, had her ears been the slightest bit pointier and her cheekbones that much more defined he might have thought she was his daughter. She and his wife shared the same long, golden hair at the very least.
Though, he supposed the eyes would be a bit harder to explain.
Ryuu appeared over his shoulder, her eyes just barely managing to peak over before she sighed and leaned around.
"I liked when you were short."
Bell rolled his eyes good-naturedly, she always said that, but it didn't have much to do with their problem at hand. Namely, the mystery girl on the couch.
Ryuu smiled down at the child, a level of motherly warmth that Bell would simply never be able to manage. Mainly because he wasn't a mother, but also because he wasn't Ryuu.
For a so-called 'useless elf' she was exceptionally good at that.
"Hey, sweetie, how'd you get in here?"
The girl shrugged.
Great. Just great.
Not sharing in Bell's own frustration, Ryuu pressed on. "Okay, can you tell me your name?"
"Aiz."
"Aiz. That's a very beautiful name."
The child said nothing, her smile didn't even twitch up at the compliment. Her golden eyes were unnervingly blank as she watched Bell's wife and he couldn't help but frown at the sight. That's not what a child's eyes should look like.
"So, Aiz, what do you remember?"
That, evidently, was not a good question to ask. Hindsight was twenty-twenty.
In Ryuu's defense, she had no way of knowing that Aiz just so happened to be a child from a millennium in the past. Nor did she know that she was born to one of the world's greatest heroes, Albert Waldstein, and his wife, Aria. She definitely couldn't know that the girl had only just witnessed her parents rush off to fight the Black Dragon, leaving her behind.
How could she? Even knowing it now Bell thought it was ridiculously vague and unnecessarily harsh. Seriously, how did Aiz even travel a thousand years into the future? Did somebody send her here? Where are they now? Couldn't they have stuck around to retrieve her when she got here to make this transition a little bit easier? He was missing a lot of important information!
At least then they would be the ones dealing with all these tears. Had this what it had been like for the people around him when he first arrived in Orario? He really hoped not. This was a lot to deal with.
He couldn't find it in himself to mind though, not even as his shirt grew damp from tears or the fabric was stretched out in spots from the child pawing needily at him. He simply sat there and took it as Ryuu hummed a melody for the girl from her spot kneeling on the floor nearby.
Damn woman pawned all of the physical contact off on him; he liked this shirt!
".. stay here?"
He leaned down, bringing his ear closer to her mouth. "What was that?"
".. can I stay here?"
Bell didn't even get a chance to respond past a defeated sigh before his lovely wife cut in. He should have expected this. The woman was always happy to offer up a bedroom, he really should have gotten a single room apartment until they were ready to have children.
"Of course, sweetie. You can stay here as long as you need."
Easy to say for the woman who won't even be able to touch her.
Aiz smiled thankfully before snuggling deeper into Bell's chest, her face disappearing fully into his newly wrinkled shirt.
Bell huffed in amusement.
"I don't think she meant in our home."
Yet, despite the outward bemoaning of his misfortune, he didn't move to shift her away from him. He felt like taking a nap anyways. There were no external factors weighing in on his decision. Certainly not. The child in his arms was just a nuisance that he was permitting to lay atop his chest because she was tired and he was feeling nice today. Nothing else.
He certainly didn't like the small, quiet child. Absolutely not. The idea, in and of itself, was preposterous.
A soft smile graced his lips as Ryuu stopped beside where he reclined on the couch, balancing with a hand on his shoulder as she leaned down and pressed a kiss to his forehead.
"You never know~ !"
His wife really had a problem with taking in strays.
"I want to meet her."
Bell turned to face his stray, abandoning his work polishing his chest plate as he raised an eyebrow toward the child.
"Well, hello to you too."
Two golden eyes rolled in the back of the child's head. "Yeah, hi and whatever, I want to meet her."
Who let this girl become so sassy? Three months under his roof and she acts like she owns the place!
Bell turned fully away from his armor, tossing the rag off into the corner and not even watching where it landed. He leaned forward onto his clasped hands and gave the golden-haired child his full attention. "And who is this 'her' person?"
"Grandma."
Bell's nose scrunched up in confusion at the name. Who could she possibly be referring to? He didn't like to assume things but he was fairly certain Albert's mom has been dead a while and he didn't even know if Aria had anybody to call 'mom.'
Aiz sighed, her arms crossing and foot tapping on the floor. "Hestia."
Bell squinted. Grandma? Hestia? Hah? Who? What? When? Why?
".. what about her?"
"I want to meet her."
"You want to meet Hestia."
"Yes."
"Why."
"Because!"
"Shouldn't you be in school or something?"
He could have sworn he and Ryuu had signed her up for that. They'd done an awful lot of paperwork. He really hoped that was what it had been for, it'd be awkward if that hadn't been for school at all.
A shrug. "It's our day off."
So, they did sign her up. That was good information.
"Why?"
"Holiday."
It was? Bell turned and glanced over at the calendar. Huh. So, it was. Who would've thought?
"And you want to visit Hestia?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because."
Right. He'd forgotten about that. Such a good reason.
"Come on, old man, let's go!"
Why's she so mean to him?
"You should respect your elders."
"Don't you mean 'respect the elderly?'"
So. Mean.
He might just cry. Honest.
She heard his knees pop while standing up one time and suddenly he was older than life itself.
Coming from the girl born a thousand years ago? Yeah, okay, it hurt a little. He wasn't old! He was a crisp twenty-five. There was nothing old about that. He was still in his prime! He doubted anybody else in the city was brave enough to call him old.
Bell grabbed two coats from the hooks in the hall and tossed the smaller one in a wad at the girl.
She caught it. Damn. He was kind of hoping it'd knock the runt over.
Aiz gave him a stupid little smirk as she slipped her arms through the sleeves and zipped the front up.
"Oh, hush you. I don't want to hear it."
If possible, her smirk only widened before she spoke. "Yes, dad."
They both froze, Bell's hand hovering over the doorknob that would be so easy to just turn and open the door to. He could walk away right now and never have to look back.
He was looking back, why was he looking back?
"You weren't supposed to hear that."
"Uh-huh."
Why wasn't he supposed to hear that? That was something he very much wanted to hear!
"A- and w- well.. you don't have to say anything! I mean it's not like you think of me as a daughter or anything- I mean I don't know w- what you're thinking but it's probably not- not that. So you shouldn't feel pressured or anything and I'm really, really sorry for saying anything and it was supposed to be in my head and not really leave my head but I tried dropping a hint with the 'grandma' thing but you weren't really getting it and– "
So, that's what that was about. Yeah, he didn't get that at all. He thought she was just being a little stinker and calling Hestia old like she liked to do with everybody.
" –I was just trying to think of a way to hint at it without outright saying it to see how you felt about it but then I had this great thought like 'maybe I should just say it' and then it just slipped out and I am so, so sorry."
Bell cocked a brow and hid a smile behind the collar of his jacket. "Get it out of your system?"
The child nodded, her gaze fixed on the buttons of her bright red, wool coat.
Bell snorted under his breath and shook his head ruefully before ruffling the girl's hair. "Let's get going, squirt."
He was fairly certain that little bit of word vomit was more words than he'd ever heard her speak ever.
He did his best to not break. He really did.
He was Bell freakin' Cranel. The kid who slew a minotaur as a level one just seven months after arriving in the city.
He was the kid who bested the Apollo familia in a war game, outmatched twenty to one.
He was the guy who, admittedly, was the cause of the obliteration of the Ishtar familia and entertainment district.
(He still got dirty looks for that).
He was the dude who did not have a monster fetish. (Stop saying he had a monster fetish. Please. His wife was right here, can't you see his lovely and wonderful and beautiful wife right here? She's not imaginary. She's not a monster. He doesn't have a monster fetish, please stop saying he has a monster fetish.)
He was that bitch and he was proud of it.
Eleven years after coming to Orario and he was, one, the strongest, two, the husband to the world's most beautiful woman, and three, a hero.
And sure it had been a hot minute since he last did any actual heroism. With the Black Dragon dead and reduced to ash there really wasn't much left to fear. The dungeon was out of commission, things were good. He wasn't needed anymore.
He wasn't washed up.
He wasn't.
He was the man who stared that lizard in the face and then killed it. As if that man could ever be washed up.
Certainly not at twenty-five.
Certainly not him.
Bell Cranel did not break. He was strong-willed.
Bell Cranel was the man who friend-zoned the goddess Freya.
Bell Cranel did not break.
He glanced over at the girl walking silently beside him.
Amendment:
Bell Cranel did not break easily.
He scooped the girl up from the ground and spun in her a circle, smiling at the faint giggles she let out all the while.
"Aiz, Ryuu and I would love nothing more than to have you think of us as your parents. We've thought of you as our own child since the day you came into our lives."
Damn. Who knew breaking could feel so good?
The little golden-haired child nodded quickly, a small smile lighting up her face as she did. It had been a long time coming, this moment, but she knew it was what she wanted. Ever since she learned of the death of the Black Dragon all she had wanted was to call the man who did it family. He made her feel.. safe.
But the trauma was still there, and it was hard to work past. The memories of her dad's death. The pain of knowing her mother returned to heaven thinking Aiz was going to be there and unable to return.
She missed them.
But she liked to think this is what they would've wanted. They'd want her to be happy. Bell and Ryuu made her happy.
Bell was nervous.
It wasn't that anything bad was happening, it was more so that something bad could happen. He'd heard horror stories from things like this.
It also wasn't something he could really hide.
Mainly because it would be incredibly obvious, but also because he was the worst liar in the history of liars.
He doesn't actually know if that was true or not, he could possibly not be the worst. Maybe second or third worst or something.
But Ryuu would eventually start showing signs or something, so he kind of just had to do this. He had to. There was no other way about it.
Bell knocked on his daughter's door.
"Aiz? Sweetie? Can we talk?"
There was a thump and then some scurrying and then another thump followed by a muffled groan.
What on earth was happening in there?
Maybe he should have given her request to learn to fight more seriously, the girl apparently had two left feet. There hadn't really been much point to learning when there's nothing to left to fight. For Bell, swordsmanship was a matter of survival, there was nothing glamorous about what he did under the tower. There was nothing beautiful in the art of death.
The door opened suddenly and out spilled the kid he called his. Bell raised an unimpressed eyebrow down at the girl splayed out around his legs before glancing through the doorway to her warzone of a bedroom.
"I thought your mother told you to clean up?"
"She.. did.. "
"And what happened to that?"
"I.. didn't?"
He can see that.
"We can deal with that later, I've some news for you and you're going to want to hear it."
She nodded and waited for her father to speak.
He didn't.
She waited some more.
So did he.
".. soo.. what is it?"
Bell sighed and shook his head.
"You should probably get off the floor and untangle yourself from your sheets."
Honestly, she was just going to crane her head up to his face while she was in the center of a tornado of blankets? What a strange child.
He watched, amused, as Aiz struggled. Her body lurched every which way as she squirmed around the floor, it was like watching a turtle who'd flipped onto their backs, but funnier. With the turtle there was always that sense of guilt when you watched, that voice in the back of your mind saying 'maybe I should help it?' He didn't suffer from that with Aiz, all he got was an overwhelming feeling of gleeful satisfaction. With the amount this girl went out of her way to drive him up the walls? Yeah, this was nice.
Sue him.
Parenting wasn't all sunshine and roses.
The number of tantrums that girl threw when she first came into their lives just because they weren't feeding her potatoes every meal? A lesser man would've cracked. Bell was no lesser man. That girl was going to eat vegetables with nutritional value, damnit.
Don't even get him started on the meltdowns. He was a notorious crier and Aiz put his record to shame. The worst part was he couldn't even blame her for it, she'd had something absolutely horrible happen to her, she was allowed to cry over it. She deserved to have all the support she needed when it happened.
Even if that meant a child was crawling into his bed at two in the morning because it was where she felt safest.
How was he even supposed to deny her that?
Answer? He couldn't.
Even if he accidentally got a foot in the face in the middle of the night because she squirmed while sleeping. Even.. even then..
Parenting was hard.
He'd even done the whole 'try to keep a plant alive to see if you'll be a good parent' thing! Kids were so much harder! What dumbass made that comparison because they clearly never raised a child who refused to wash herself. Evidently, they didn't have showers a thousand years in the past. According to seven-year-old time travelers, showers are witchcraft and grounds for biting the man who just wants them to stop smelling.
It certainly didn't help that Ryuu's experience with her own parents was less than stellar thanks to their rather.. cavalier opinions on non-faeries. Bell's grandfather didn't do him any favors either unless he wanted to teach Aiz how to be a pervert.
He didn't.
He'd just like that to be known; he did not want Aiz to be a pervert.
Nightmare fuel, honestly.
The thought gave him the heebie-jeebies.
Nothing scared him more. And he killed the Black Dragon!
What was he supposed to be doing again?
Oh, right, talking to Aiz.
He should probably check back in on her progress untangling herself.
The father glanced down and immediately snorted at his daughter's scowl.
"Help. Me."
Hm. He'd have to think about that.
"What's in it for me?"
The girl paused to think which was already an improvement from her typical 'it's easier to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission' philosophy.
"I'll.. eat vegetables for a week."
The father crossed his arms in disappointment.
"You'll eat them either way because I told you to."
"I'll eat them without complaining."
Fuck. That was like music to his ears. Like a siren's song. He'd never heard words that meant more to him than those five words. Not even when Ryuu said 'I do.'
.. don't tell her he said that.
He needed to remain strong.
"Two weeks."
"One and a half."
"Three."
"W- what!? That's higher!"
"Four."
"Dad!"
"Fine," he sighed, "five weeks."
She squawked and made to tackle him only to faceplant as the blankets connecting her to the bed tightened. A harumph escaped her lips as she pouted into the floorboards before giving in. "Two weeks."
"I'm glad we could come to an agreement, Little Gale."
As if some cutesy nickname would make her feel better! She was Aiz Waldstein-Cranel! She didn't like cutesy nicknames!
Well, okay. Maybe she did. But only a little!
"Daaaaad," she whined, "can you please get me out of here?"
He relented. "Fine, fine. What's the magic word?"
"I love you?"
Good enough!
Bell snorted as he got work unweaving the web of blankets his daughter had spun. She'd do well as a seamstress if she kept this up.
He stuck his tongue out as he worked, pulling at different portions and occasionally spinning the child around as the cocoon unraveled. Just a few more tugs and—
"Kyaa!"
—she's free!
With her limbs finally released and mobile, Aiz made sure to put them to good use!
The golden-haired girl tackled Bell in a hug, laying a quick kiss on his cheek with a 'thanks!' before scampering off. Grabbing all of the blankets scattered across her dirty floor, she tossed them atop her bed.
Bell took the moment to simply watch her dart around the room, quickly cleaning up the floor enough to be almost passable in her mother's eyes. His daughter had grown a lot in the year since she arrived. Her time in school had helped a lot, being around kids her age helped her slow down in her relentless rush to mature. Then again, he doubted any of them had come close to her friendship with Mikoto and Haruhime's little Sakura. The things those two kids got up to together? He shuddered at the memories. How Aiz managed to corrupt a child as precious as little Sakura was beyond him. He doubted he'd ever be able to apologize to the two mothers enough.
Even just watching her now, Bell pitied his future self. The number of men he'd have to scare off was going to be ridiculous. Perks of being the world's strongest adventurer, he supposed.
"So, what did you want to tell me?"
Oh. Right. That.
How should he say this?
Bluntly. Bluntly was good.
"You're going to be a sister!"
Aiz ran out of the room.
".. fuck."
Bluntly was not the way to go.
This was exactly what he'd been afraid of. He knew some kids reacted poorly to the idea of getting new siblings, thinking their new brother or sister would mean less love for themselves. It was an especially big issue among adopted children.
He should have known this was going to be hard on Aiz. They'd only just had the breakthrough where she admitted that she was scared they would one day disappear on her too. That she was cursed to lose everything she held dear because she was a bad kid. She wasn't, she was amazing. Sure, she was a stinker sometimes, but she Bell would never, never say she was bad.
He loved her. Ryuu loved her. Mikoto and Haruhime both loved her. Lili (begrudgingly) loved her, even if getting her to admit it was like pulling teeth. Welf loved her. Welf loved damn well near everyone, but he loved her especially. Hestia, not even a question (the haranguing Bell got for keeping Aiz a secret for several months before bringing her to visit was un-real; he couldn't possibly have been making sure Aiz was in a good place mentally before taking him to see his frankly overwhelming familia, not at all.)
Aiz was not bad, no matter what the child thought.
But none of that mattered right now.
Aiz was upset and that was what took priority, the reasons why be damned he wasn't going to let his daughter think this changed anything.
Bell shot to his feet, taking off down the hallway and only slightly cracking the floorboards. He'd get a tongue lashing for that later. Priorities! Bell passed his and Ryuu's bedroom, barely even registering the muffled squealing from inside.
".. "
".. "
.. muffled squealing?
He doubled back, startling the two girls occupying the bed as he slammed his way through the door. His wide, panicked eyes scanning the entirety of the room before landing on the surprised faces of his wife and daughter.
"W– wha—?"
He was so confused. So very confused.
What exactly was happening right now because it looked like his daughter was sitting beside his wife and trying to feel for a kick. But that couldn't be it..
.. right?
Aiz blinked and pointed down at Ryuu's belly. "Did you want a turn?"
Bell slumped to the ground in relief.
"I thought you ran away! You don't know how worried I was!"
Aiz had the decency to look ashamed. "I'm sorry, I was just.. really happy a- and I wanted t- to feel the baby a- and I- I—"
She cut herself off as she blinked back tears and Bell immediately felt like the worst person in the world. He shouldn't have yelled, he'd just been stressing out about this for a while now and they finally felt sure enough that Ryuu was pregnant to tell Aiz and– and he was just making excuses. What mattered was he shouldn't have yelled.
Bell stood up and moved over to the bed, setting down on the bed just to the child's side and drawing her into his chest. "I'm sorry, I'm not angry, I was just scared you'd run off." There was a sniffle in his shirt and Bell felt his heart clench. One of his hands went up, softly stroking through Aiz's hair in the way he knew she loved and he planted a soft kiss on the crown of her head.
Ryuu offered him a small smile over the top of their daughter's head as she sat beside him before joining in on the hug and smushing their little gale between the two of them.
"This won't change anything, you know that right, Aiz? Your father and I love you and we love your little brother and sister; nothing is going to be any different besides there'll be another little one. That's all."
The girl nodded and sniffled, relishing the warmth her parents gave off. "S- sorry.. "
"There's nothing to apologize for, little gale, your father and I aren't upset. Your old man has always been a bit of a worrier."
Another nod and the parents sighed as Aiz backed up and rubbed away her tears. "I'm okay, I'm okay." She blinked her eyes back open and took in the smiling image of the two people who took her in a year ago. "So.. the baby?"
Ryuu snorted and ruffled the girl's hair. "I already told you it's too soon to feel her kick, sweetie, it'll be a couple more months before something like that."
Aiz pouted. "But I want to feel it noow."
Ah. There she is.
There was a high-pitched squeal and Bell honestly couldn't say who it came from. It could've been Ryuu. It could've been Haruhime. It could've been Mikoto. It even could've been Aiz or Sakura.
Hell, he wasn't even confident it hadn't been him.
All he could say with absolute certainty was that somebody had squealed.
"Tell us everything!"
Oh. It was Mikoto. He probably should have guessed, he'd seen how she got around baths and this was (arguably) more exciting than that.
Ryuu took a half step back and waved her arms through the air frantically.
"I- I couldn't! That's p- private information!"
"I bet you'd tell Syr!"
Ryuu put her foot down. "That's different!"
"What? How?"
"I can't talk to you two about my sex life!" She leaned in and whispered harshly toward the couple, occasionally sending nervous glances toward the two children. Aiz and Sakura had taken to scaling some tree and Bell was keeping a close eye on them. After the fiasco with the blankets last week, he really didn't trust Aiz to do anything requiring coordination. "That's something that's meant to be kept between Bell and I."
Mikoto and Haruhime blinked in sync. Once. Twice. Thrice. They glanced toward one another and gave each other a bewildered look before turning back toward the elf and blinking again. Haruhime's tail flicked nervously behind her as she spoke, her samurai nodding along as she did. "We just wanted to know how far along you were.. "
Well, okay, it's not like they'd object to any saucy details, but they weren't exactly seeking them out. At least not Mikoto, she really didn't want to imagine her captain in a scenario like that. Haruhime had less of a problem with it, but she really did just want to know about the baby.
The elf sighed in relief. "Oh thank the gods, I thought you wanted to know about," she swallowed thickly with a heavy blush and shook her head, "a- anyways! I'm only about nine weeks pregnant, but we're super excited! It's been a long time coming, we'd even meant to start trying earlier but with Aiz and making sure she was okay it just.. " She trailed off and the two Far Eastern girls nodded knowingly. Aiz had taken up a lot of attention from just about everybody in the familia. She was a sweet girl, but there was a lot of work needed to get her to where she was today. Just the thought of her giggling as she climbed trees with Sakura was unthinkable when she first arrived. The sheer size of the city unnerved her, the crowds caused her to tremble, and she saw a pair of gleaming red eyes in every shadow she looked into.
"Still, that's such an amazing step forward for the two of you!"
Ryuu smiled and glanced over her shoulder to watch Bell catch the girls as they jumped down from the branch. The white-haired father swung them both in the air before catching them again as they laughed uproariously. As soon as they were set back down on the ground they grabbed one another's hand and took off running, splitting up only to do cartwheels through the lawn before immediately latching onto one another again.
The elfess blinked.
".. you don't think—?"
"We have our suspicions but they're still a little young to say for certain."
"Huh."
Well, they would look cute together.
"That they would."
Oh. She said that out loud.
It was true though, the two would go perfectly with one another. Just thinking of the possible grandbabies with Sakura's pale pink eyes and Aiz's golden hair or Aiz's golden hair and Sakura's obsidian hair. Ah. Adorable. She was about ready to swoon. The possibilities were endless!
She just couldn't wait for what the future had in store for her little ones. Eee! She loved them all so much!
Yes, the future was looking bright for everyone.
The cursed first draft that I wrote and regretted:
"So, Aiz, what do you remember?"
That, evidently, was not a good question to ask. Hindsight was twenty-twenty.
In Ryuu's defense, she had no way of knowing that Aiz just so happened to be a child from a millennium in the past. Nor did she know that she was born to one of the world's greatest heroes, Albert Waldstein, and his wife, Aria. She definitely couldn't know that the girl had only just witnessed her parents rush off to fight the Black Dragon, leaving her behind.
How could she? Even knowing it now Bell thought it was ridiculously vague and unnecessarily harsh. Seriously, how did Aiz even travel a thousand years into the future? Did somebody send her here? Where are they now? Couldn't they have stuck around to retrieve her when she got here to make this transition a little bit easier?
There were a lot of questions and absolutely no answers.
But, on the bright side—
"Oh. Yeah, I already killed the dragon, so that's not a problem."
—he had done that.
"Oh."
Weird. He usually gets more of a reaction to that, perhaps the child was just in shock?
Aiz shrugged.
"I guess I'll just have to marry you then."
Ryuu choked and fell backward onto the floor, the rug fully pulled out from under her. Bell wasn't faring much better.
"I beg your pardon?"
Aiz - and Bell felt the need to remind himself that this girl was seven-years-old and gods that is so unbelievably gross - merely shrugged again. Her eyes impassive and unbothered by her sudden, and very bold, declaration. "I hope you'll make a good husband."
"Yeah, no. Not gonna happen lil' lady. I– and I can't believe I need to actually say this – will not be marrying you. Not now, not ever."
Eugh! So gross!
Bell wished, more than he'd ever wished for anything, to forget this ever happened. Gods he just couldn't get those words out of his mind!
'I'll just have to marry you then.'
Like what?
'I hope you'll make a good husband.'
Well, for your information you reverse pedophile, I am the best of husbands.
He needed a drink. A strong one.
Perhaps Gareth would entertain him tonight, he felt like he needed a heavy drinker to bring along if he is to ever hope of erasing these past ten minutes from his life.
Aiz, the pervert, merely cocked her head to the side.
"Am I not pretty enough for you?"
Oh gods, he was really going to hurl this time.
Bell dry heaved, a hand clawing fruitlessly at his chest as he retched and coughed.
So gross! So, so gross!
Child! Child! Ahh! Child! Oh gods, why was a child saying something like that!? So wrong. So, so wrong. Hurk– He might vomit. Oh, so gross. So, wrong. Child. She was a child. Bleh.
His only solace was that Ryuu wasn't doing much better at all. He couldn't really tell if she was laughing or crying or just trembling, but she was definitely doing something.
"You're a kid!"
Then, unsurprisingly (why was he still surprised?) Aiz just shrugged again.
Okay, first things first, Aiz is never, ever having another conversation with a man. Bell did not need to worry about random ass orphan girls proposing to random dudes on the street for whatever reason she may have.
Second things second, he needed to fix this girl's emotions. Nobody should be able to say everything she just said without smiling or laughing. It's just not humanly possible.
Third things third, alcohol. Lots of alcohol.
He really needed a drink.
Would it be considered domestic abuse to leave his wife alone with the girl?
Probably.