Chapter 8
Tick…...Tock…...Tick…...Tock …...Tick…...Tock …...Tick…...Tock …...
Boredom...
Is there only one other thing in the universe able to slow down Time so much?
For a little red-haired princess, with a white strand, the answer was negative, and she was probably the in the best position to know it. She had spent the last days doing nothing, talk with the paint and do Tick-Tock with her tongue before the clock of the library, drawing a little bit from time to time.
And to study was ABSOLUTELY NOT a way to combat boredom for her.
Sprawled on a sofa, she had nothing better to do than looking at the pendulum swinging again ... and again ... and again ... and again ... and again...
The clock sounded ten in the morning, in response to which the adorable girl seemed bothered, then sighed a big blow. She turned her gaze to the ceiling and stared out into space, in a mixture of weariness and sadness. She wanted so much that something happened. Anything that could break the calm of today and cover the sound of the clock, which really seemed to be the only sound in the world right now. This tranquility grieved her a little, because it reminded her of the heavy solitude in which she lived.
She wondered where could be Steven.
It had been two weeks since the strange young man appeared, it was like forever for Anna. And although neither she nor her sister had managed to understand who he really was, their life had become so less monotonous since they met, more or less a year ago, that Anna was hoping to see him every day coming from nowhere, today more than usually.
The red-haired princess began to say with a low voice, almost like a prayer.
"Steven ... If only you were here ..."
Soon after, she jumped with surprise when she heard a loud crash, followed by a young groaning voice.
"OUCH! ... Oooow... My heaaaad. Healer Please."
Firstly surprise, Anna recognized then this plaintive voice and smiled. She literally jumped up from the couch and ran behind it. She found exactly what she hoped so much.
Just under the table of the library, the young Steven Ryan was rubbing his head with a rictus of pain. But Anna was too happy to see him to care about that, his appearances were not as regular as she wanted. And they were completely unpredictable, he could appear three days after his last one as several weeks after.
The last days were so painful for the little girl that she didn't waste time.
"Steven!" She screamed with joy, literally throwing herself on him, hugging him so quickly and cheerfully that she pinned to the ground.
"Ouch!" Blew the geek, taken by surprise, bumping his head against the floor.
"A ... Anna? Is that you?" He asked.
"I'm so glad to see you!" She spoke, carried away by his enthusiasm.
The mini-geek, always a little lost, announced.
"Well ... Me too actually. Especially knowing what I have left behind me."
"What do you mean?" She asked, raising her little eyes at him.
Steven sighed before answering.
"Nothing I want to remind frankly. Let's just say I just had a problem that gave me the headache of the century."
Saying this, he was thinking about a certain blond kunoichi with the force of a Colossus and feminine curves so developed that it was almost too much for him.
'I'm sure even Lieutenant Matsumoto don't have so big ones...' He thought. 'Well ... On second thought...'
But to his astonishment, he found himself having in mind the image of a scary bear and the one of a very large red-haired warrior, Scottish apparently, with a friendly face. Steven did not know what it was exactly but let himself forget this very quickly. It often happened to him to have images in mind that disappeared in an instant. And as he was well aware that a normal person dreams several times at night, he supposed, from the time that those images were residues of his dreams before those in Arendelle, unlike the 'visions' that came to him BEFORE he faint.
And yes, indeed, he still believed that his visits to the Frozen's kingdom were figments of his imagination.
The Otaku gently broke free from Anna's hug and get out from under the table with her, while she was holding the pentacle medallion, he had given her before. He took off some dust from his shirt, asking her, like it was normal for him.
"So ... What's new since the last time?"
"Not much actually." Said the little red haired. "Apart from my birthday that you missed ..."
The boy with the strand could not help but notice that she actually had changed a little during what had apparently been a year for her, but six months for him. She had become a bit taller and her braids, a little longer. It was pretty strange because the body of the little geek seemed to have grown at the same rate than her and Elsa's one. However, she remained very cute with her little black dress with a brown and green top.
"Oh damn..." he interjected, somewhat ashamed. "I'm sorry. You know I cannot control my going and coming. And I have nothing to offer you ..."
Indeed, he didn't have the opportunity to get his stuffs back and, at the same time, change his clothes since their first meeting. But as its arrivals were already very strange, and even magical for Anna and her sister, the two princesses did not really payed attention.
"Oh no, no! Don't worry." Said the girl. "Your mere presence is enough. If you knew how bored I was, all alone, since your last visit. I was almost going to look at the dust falling, or worse ... Study more. So, you cannot imagine how happy I am to see my guardian angel. "
"I told you to not call me like that." Replied the geek, ill-at-ease. "It's embarrassing. I'm just a dreamer."
"Whatever, as long as you are here." Continued the girl.
Steven raised his eyes to heaven. He had never taken the time to explain that all this world was a dream for him, mainly because he saw no interest in talking about this to a creation of his own mind. And when the girls asked him some questions, which was quite rare, he gave evasive answers or talked about something else, saying that it did not matter.
The little redhead, now excited and bouncing, then declared.
"Now we'll have some fun."
Intrigued by how much she seemed happy to see the small metalhead with chains, he asked, chuckling a little.
"Hey calm down little girl hehe ... We are not in a platform game. You were bored so much? Couldn't you chat with your sister?"
"Not since your last visit. She said that the time she spent with you during this year has been so nice and interesting that she had many works to do now. If she doesn't do it, she will be late and have to many things to do after apparently. So, she asked me to let her alone a bit to work quietly. "
The little geek reacts with a small annoyance crossed with satisfaction, a new feeling for him.
"Well ... That's nice. You'll thank her for me please."
"You're not going to see her?" Anna wondered.
"If she really wants to study, I do not want to bother her. And I understand that with Bilbo, Lord of the Rings and the Silmarillion, I had occupied her more than a day. Even if I consider she had better spend her time listening to me than by working. "
"I didn't know you were so arrogant." Joked the little red haired, hands on hips.
The Geek hurriedly corrected, laughing.
"No, what I mean is that I think it is more important to read the Lord of the Rings than math theorems. Anyway, that's how I spent my time at school. "
Anna deduced, more surprised than before.
"You did not study, then?"
The Geek replied.
"Only the bare minimum. I spent more time playing, watching or reading my stories than anything else in class. How do you think I learned so many?"
The little princess chuckled announcing.
"Elsa would not be very happy if she knew that."
"Oh, she knows it." Informed Steven. "I told her some month ago."
"And how did she react?"
"By lecturing me, of course." He remembered with amusement. "But to be honest, I did not really listen. She was a little like Anna from Shaman King."
The young man did a kindly caricature of Elsa.
"And that's perfectly irresponsible. And it's important to study. And blah blah blah and blah blah blah."
Anna and Steven laughed together. Then Steven took a breath before adding, more serious but still smiling.
"Okay, I'm exaggerating a little, she was not so cutting and was not wrong at all."
Anna replied without losing her childish cheerfulness.
"Oh you're not funny now."
The metalhead then explained, lightly.
"Sorry Anna. But it is not nice to badmouth someone behind his or her back, even just to joke."
Her smile diminished a bit.
"Believe me, I know that well."
Then he seemed joyful again.
"And, you know, I really respect your sister. Really much for an eleven years old girl. Maybe we think the same thing actually. We just don't have the same life, me and her."
The princess looked at him a moment, quite astonished, then she admitted with joy.
"It's less funny but it's nice what you said."
The geek was surprised again, then rubbed his neck, a little embarrassed.
It was what Anna liked the most about him: He was a very nice person, always ready to help her and Elsa to smile and he didn't like saying bad things about the others. The little girl understood it during the year that had elapsed, even if he was very strange and stubborn.
But then she realized that they had spent a little time chatting, which bothered the little girl with a white strand.
The otaku did not come that often and she knew he could go away at any moment without being able to do anything about it. He stood only a few hours usually, which generally pushed the little girls, also because of their boredom and loneliness, to go directly to the fun and not talk so much when he was there.
The child that was Anna, fully aware that their time together was limited and unknown, did not want to waste any more time chatting. She began to jump and asked.
"Well then? We play we play?"
Steven sighed, rubbed his head, groaning and explained.
"Okay, but try not to overdo it, please. I have the impression of having been punched by Terminator."
Being accustomed to his references she did not understand, Anna nodded cheerfully ... then stay silent.
A strange calm settled between her and the mini-metalheads.
No one knew what to say or do.
After a moment, which was quite disturbing, Anna cleared her throat and tried.
"So ... what we gonna do?"
Steven blinked ... then shrugged in response.
"I do not know. What you wanna do?"
The princess tried to find something asap. She refused to be bored again.
Steven, not wanting to be bored neither, especially in what he considered one of his dreams, made some proposal.
"I can tell you a new story if you want. I'm sure you will love my adventures in Tamriel."
The girl thought about it before answering.
"No, thank you. Maybe at some another time. Now, I really want to play."
The little geek with medallions looked a little disappointed. But he soon resigned and began to think harder. But he had to admit.
"Well... I really don't know."
Anna then suggested.
"You never let me hear your songs, the ones you whistle sometime. We could sing a little."
"I WILL FIND A GAME!" Hurried to pronounce the metalheads.
Even if he had sometimes the curious desire to do it since he arrived here, he was always horrified by the idea of singing. He began to think even faster than in a League of Legends match against champions, which aggravated his headache. He ends up having an idea he explained.
"We could play the assassin and the Templar."
Anna, stunned by this suggestion, asked, not very reassured.
"Uh ... What is it?"
Steven understood her concern then tried to reassure her explaining.
"Don't worry. Actually, it's quite simple. Whoever plays the Templar pursues the assassin and must touch him to become the assassin then. Except that the assassin has the right to climb over the furniture, and not the Templar. He cannot touch the assassin when he's climbing but the assassin has no right to stop moving. "
"It's like the Tag game then?"
"Yeah, a little."
"But what is the link with an assassin and a Templar?"
"Another one of my stories. It's too long to explain. So? Are you interested then?"
The young redhead hesitated, before letting this strange detail aside, then asked to her guardian angel.
"But you do not run a lot, right? It might stop soon."
"Don't worry about me. I'm sure climbing or waiting until you climb will make me save my stamina. If I can manage it without problems against the sixteen colossus, it should be fine."
Anna reflexively ignored the reference and found herself grinning. She was finally going to have fun after a long period of calm and solitude.
"So, who begin who begin?" she said jumping.
Steven was delighted to see her like that. He had seen how she was alone and sad in this great castle, especially with her sister cloistered in her room. Giving her some happiness made him feel good, he thought, moreover, that this was why he dreamed so often about this place. Dreaming of a movie that he has never seen to imagine himself helping an innocent person was not so illogical actually. So it was the explanation he kept to justify that he was dreaming of this place so often.
He then suggested with a smile.
"Normally I'd hate to be Templar, that's the reason why I finished Rogue so quickly, but as you seem so energetic, and because I like you obviously, I let you..."
Steven didn't have time to finish his sentence that the little redhead went like an arrow by announcing cheerfully.
"Youuu wiiiill not catch meee."
The mini geek, surprised a moment, was pursuing her in an instant.
This started an adorable chase through the entire castle of Arendelle. Steven was smart, he could predict where Anna could jump, but she was faster, and far more unpredictable, than he thought.
They had fun by chasing themselves like dogs and cats while avoiding being noticed. Over time, they learned which places needed to be avoided, in which rooms were the king and the queen in general and where the few remaining guard where in the castle. Steven mentally noted all of this. He did not want to be caught and then stop having fun with Anna and Elsa.
He had principally told stories to the princesses, but the little red haired with a white strand made him do all kinds of game he had never practiced with anyone else, like hide and seek or playing with dolls. And even if he thus found himself quite ridiculous sometimes, he had to recognize that he would not have exchanged these moments for anything, not even an autographed by Kojima version of Metal Gear Solid 5.
Except with his grandfather, and his science teacher, he never seemed to have spent so much pleasant time with anyone, not even his parents.
In fact... Especially not with his parents.
So, he cherished every dream he had with the Arendelle's princesses. They were very precious to him, a real liberation when he fell asleep in his cell in Konoha.
After a quite long time in the corridors, the two children began to be a little tired, especially Steven, despite his methods to save his endurance. He therefore reminded about the plan of the castle, as he has done for the Spencer mansion in Resident Evil, and succeeded in pushing Anna in a corridor without furniture leading to the central stairs of the palace. As they were on the first floor, he could enjoy the descent and probably touch her, letting him than a chance to ask for a break.
While the two children were approaching, Anna saw clearly where she was going. The red-haired princess did not understand the plan of the mini geek with medallions, she did not think at all when she had fun, but she did something he had not expected.
The laughing princess clung to the banister, which no longer gave the right to Steven to touch her, according to the rules he had himself established. But then the little otaku began to worry.
Indeed, Anna began to climb on the banister, still laughing, and eventually staying on it like an acrobat. Steven tensed, really worried, he knew how high she was and that the fall could be hard for a child like her. He began to feel fear and stuttered a bit asking her.
"Hey ... Can ... Can you go down please?"
"Why would I do that?" She said amused. "I'm too fast so you're begging me now? Hehe"
She took a step forward on the banister.
"No, but ... You're not Lara Croft." Worried the geek. "So, if you could just go down before you fall."
She took another step forward.
"Hihihi ... Don't worry. I am the best."
Steven began to have his heart beating faster.
"Anna ... Please ... Get down..."
The princess took another step on the banister. And that's when an elegant woman quietly entered into the hall, downstairs; And when she saw the little princess so high on it, she tensed with fear.
Anna then declared, without having noticed the newcomer.
"Oh stop that. I control ..."
Her foot slipped.
In a split second, the three people in the room had their heart skipping a beat.
Anna began to lose balance. She leaned dangerously toward the wrong side of the banister, the one where an eight years old girl would fall headlong from one floor.
But Steven, very worried, had prepared for this horrible eventuality. He used his reflexes honed by hours of video games of all kinds to strongly grasp the hand of Anna and made her felt toward him.
So, the little girl fell on Steven rather than the castle's floor, which revived his headache that had calmed a bit before. Anna looked up at his friend, ready to laugh. But the glare the geek had stopped this desire.
The lady on the ground floor started running toward the stairs without children, still choked, does noticing her. She stopped surprised when she perceived a young and angry voice she had never heard before.
Steven had pushed the little princess and started screaming.
"Are you completely oblivious?! Climbing such a thing?!"
Anna seemed confused. The tone of her friend paralyzed and made her feel ill at heart. He never had seemed so angry. He never had been against her actually. She tried to speak, with a quavering voice.
"I ... I thought we... had fun..."
While the lady was slowly climbing the steps, in a mixture of anxiety and curiosity, her footsteps being muffled by the carpet, Steven replied to the princess with the same angry voice.
"Oh because foolishly risking your life like that is fun for you?"
Anna looked at her friend straight in the eye, with an air that surprised and alarmed the young man. The princess seemed lost and on the verge of crying.
Steven did not at first understood what was going on with her. He thought he had barely raised his voice, nothing so horrible. Then he seemed to grasp a little, thereby widening his eyes: He was her only friend in a universe which imposed her an extreme solitude. He understood completely what she was feeling.
The young man with medallions calmed, almost suddenly. She seemed to calm down also, still confused, seeing his worried look as he said gently, and raising his hands.
"Hey ... Don't pull a face like that, Anna. I'm not rejecting or blaming you ..."
The princess looked at him for a moment ... and saw that he seemed sincere. She then asked him, without anger but with a sad anxiety.
"So why did you yell at me?"
When the lady stopped, opening her eyes wide of amazement, Steven answered the girl with a caring voice.
"Because I was very afraid for you. You could have hurt you terribly or worse if you had fall from so high. I would have feel really bad if something had happened to you."
The princess with a white strand was silent for a moment before asking him.
"… Really ?"
"Of course." Steven confirmed. "I don't want that something horrible happen to you."
Steven saw the princess relaxing a bit, then noticed her little hands clutching the medallion he had given her. He knew she had been afraid, even a little, that he turns his back on her. She was too young, and too lonely, to not have this kind of fear. He wanted to reassure her, only a little.
He then declared, in a soft voice.
"Anna, Listen ... I will never abandon you. You don't have to be afraid."
The little girl looked at him with big eyes, before asking.
"... You promise me?"
Steven twitched one second. He did not promise anything lightly. But strangely, he did not hesitate for one second to confirm.
"I promise you. And Steven Ryan ALWAYS keep his promises."
His eyes still looked at the pentacle he offered to Anna and he declared.
"I promise on that medallion I gave you. It was one of my favorites, believe me. Every time you'll see it, you can remember what I told you. You will remember that I promised to always watch over you. After all..."
He sighed, rolling his eyes.
"I am your guardian angel. No?"
Anna seemed frozen for a while. Then she grinned, with eyes that seemed about to cry with joy. Without warning, she hugged the mini-geek, which made him tense a little. He tensed even more when he heard her whispering.
"Thank you…"
But it warmed his heart to hear that word. He relaxed when the redhead did it to.
But while the two children again crossed their looks, a worried woman's voice uttered near them.
"Anna ...?"
The princess and the young man jumped and discovered a dark-haired woman in purple dress who was watching them from the stairs with a bemused face.
They were so worried about what happened they didn't even notice her presence. It was a disaster.
Steven knew who she was. For six months, or a year, he had yield treasures of imaginations to not be found by her or her husband.
Now the geek and the princess were on the verge of panic.
Anna's mother, the Queen Iduna, had just discovered Steven.
List of references:
Bleach, Brave, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, Shaman King, Terminator, The Jungle Book, The Elder Scrolls, League of Legends, Assassin's Creed, Shadow of the Colossus, Assassin's Creed: Rogue, Metal Gear Solid V: Phantom Pain, Naruto, Resident Evil, Tomb Raider