Hey guys. I know it has been quiet for me but sorry. I am working on ideas for my fics but school is back in action. And I have begun a YouTube channel where I play the Division while giving tips. I'm also intending to marathon Assassin's Creed Origins and Odyssey, Far Cry 5, Rainbow Six Siege and finish Ghost Recon Wildlands. And that's just Uplay. Got some more games on Steam.

That asides, small chapters like these are okay to work out. So this is an idea that I have been having for a while and I could fit this on the Grad Stud, given the current mood on that fic, I'm going to leave that open.

So here is something else.

Mattheus was sitting down in the class, at the back end with Joel in his lap. He was ruffling through the hair of the younger boy who clearly enjoyed the ministrations. It wasn't just pats on the head, it was more going over different spots. Like there was a giant cat sitting on his lap. He could swear that a bit more and Joel would begin to purr.

"And why do you want me to do this again?" Mattheus asked Joel who smirked at him. "Well, I read somewhere that you can do this sort of thing without FBI knocking at your door."

"You need to cut back on those videos. Besides, isn't this normal for us?" Joel turned back as Mattheus got a little bit rougher on his head. With a grin, Joel looked back at him. "God, I like this. I don't know why but I like you ruffling my hair." Mattheus just shrugged on the action. For him, this was just a show of platonic affection showed towards Joel.

Mattheus and Joel stuck with each other. They were each other's brothers and best friends despite the age gap of nine years. But Joel wasn't your typical twelve year old and Mattheus wasn't your typical twenty year old. Besides the fact that he was back in high school, there was a lot more to say about him.

They didn't care but they saw stares from the class going to them.

And who wouldn't be surprised? Kizuna and Ichika asides, the captain of the best team of junior HHG's and the first male Infinite Stratos pilot, Mattheus and Joel were a whole different cookie. So one of the pilots worked up the courage and walked over to Mattheus.

He turned to them and they looked at the girl who was fidgeting. Mattheus looked pretty rough all things considered. While in his own country, he wasn't abnormal, in this school, Mattheus was as rebel as you could get. He flipped off the lines that told him what he could and couldn't wear. He was in his twenties, no way that a high school could tell him what he could and couldn't do.

Same with Joel. Rude and fearless made for a very hard spot in some cases.

"Ano, Adjzof-kun?" Still, not getting used to the honorific, he nodded. "Yes." He said, not even mildly hostile.

"Who do you love the most?" A very intimate question, even in this school. Mattheus knew there were different values in this school compared to his home in Belgium but even there, they didn't ask that sort of thing at the drop of a hat. But knowing that only an honest answer would be fitting here, Mattheus decided to go with that.

"In what way? I don't have a girlfriend if you want to know that. And my social life killed itself after high school so I don't see my old friends that much. As for family, that's not your business. But so I guess that Joel is the closest person to me."

The girls got a certain glint in their eyes and Mattheus wasn't sure if he liked it.

"Ano, Joel-chan. Who do you love the most?" Joel looked back to Mattheus and then to the girl. He wasn't sure where this was going and he wasn't sure if he liked it.

"I only got Mattheus so I guess that I love him the most. But for me, Mattheus is a brother, friend, care taker, parent. So that's the way I see it."

"So you did kidnap him from the streets and brought him in your house." Mattheus raised an eyebrow who would come up with that horror story. "Eh, no. Do you girls know who I am?"

The girls shook their heads. "Okay, let's go back about five years ago. In Flanders Expo, in Ghent, there was a certain female pilot."

"Adjzof Freya." The girls spoke her name and Mattheus wasn't surprised that they heard of that name. Freya Adjzof was seen as one of the strongest pilots out there and one of the best.

"Yes, she was killed there but wait, Adjzof Freya. Does that mean you Adjzof-kun and Adjzof Freya were related?" Joel began to doubt if those girls were the best in the world because they shared the same name.

He knew that from the moment he walked through those damned gates.

"Yeah, I mean. If she was called Adjzof Freya and I am called Adjzof Mattheus, doesn't that mean that she and I are blood related. Of course, we were. She was my little sister. She was killed and well, Joel was badly wounded. So I carried him out and he decided to live with me. I didn't see an issue with it. And for the story, look it up. But no, I did not kidnap him. He wanted to live with me and I needed someone to look after so I had no issue with that."

Mattheus didn't want to talk about it but it had been five years. Time might heal wounds but it leaves very, very nasty scars. And some wounds might heal very bad. He and Joel lost more than enough in that one day. So he took Joel in and the two continued to live on each other. Both used each other as emotional crutches and grew out that role.

It wasn't healthy but now, they grew to the point they were okay with living like this. Joel and Mattheus were two boys who were nearly always together. They had spent time and they grew to the point that brothers was the correct term.

"And why do you ask me who I love the most and why I would have to kidnap him for that?"

"So you didn't look him up in your house and kept him there for him to live in?" Mattheus wasn't sure who could come up with this crap but he had an idea what those girls were talking about.

"What the fuck? No. Mattheus did not lock me up in his house. I worked at the machine and he went to work to support me and him. During the day, I worked on the machine he is using now and he worked at his father's workplace. During the evenings, we ate out or he cooked. In the weekends, we went out or just took it easy. But in the street, they knew about me and they knew who I was and who Mattheus was. I wasn't a secret for anyone. Now, why the hell do you ask this?"

There were more girls gathering around him. "So it's true that you're his uke, Pearce-chan?" Not knowing what chan stood for and not wanting to know, Joel had a good idea where this was going.

"Uke. You mean that…. and you think that he… and me and that…." A look of disgust washed over his face and Mattheus' one.

"I am not like that. I am interested in girls, not in guys. And even if I swung that way, which I don't, I wouldn't think about doing that with a boy. What the fuck?" Mattheus was now getting mad. Those girls were all asking questions which he did not want to answer.

"But you were pretty cuddly with him so it must have meant." A HHG pilot spoke up. "that you and Pearce are having a relationship like that."

"There is something you should know miss. Where I come from, it's not abnormal to show affection to your kids or even your younger siblings. What I do is well within boundaries of what at my place we see as normal. If Joel doesn't want to do that, I will never force him. Joel is sitting in my lap and I ruffle his hair. That is not showing any sort of attraction. It's a show of platonic affection between me and between him. Joel is okay with it, I'm okay with it. I get that you guys think it is something like that but it's no sexual relationship. We share a brother like one. And now fuck off. I had enough of you all."

The girls weren't really moving away until Mattheus materialized his handgun and waved over their heads. "Move." The girls walked away and Joel was glaring at them.

"What the fuck was that?"

"You tell me, Joel. You tell me."

And that is something that I got in my head after watching a show of this season. I have a watch list of anime that I desperately need to cut down but the show what gave me this idea is not on my list. Make a guess what show I am talking about.

Oh and if you guys are wondering who drew the cover, search up Oslight. He drew a few commisisons for me last summer and I'm really happy with those. On his profile, there ae quite a few of him.

Saluut.