Chapter 26: Let's Just See

Alex woke up laying in his bed. Well he was half on the bed the other half was dangling off. He reached out to grab one of his flasks that was laying by his hand only to find it had moved at some point.

"Looking for this?" Alex looked up to see Hunter sitting in a recliner, flask in hand. Oh so he was in Hunters room? Wait when did Hunter get a recliner? "Alex why are you drinking." Alex unknowingly made a face when he was asked this. Then the memories of last evening came to mind and he started to feel awful again. Sitting up he rubbed his eyes.

"I'm such a fucking asshole." Hunter sighed. He had been dealing with the drunken man for the last six hours only getting a rest once he passed out about thirty minutes ago. However Alex was acting differently, usually when drunk Alex was just a more excited, less coordinated, and easier to entertain variant of himself. but last night or was it this morning? Whichever, the point is he was he wasn't acting himself. He was moping around the bar feeling sorry for himself and generally acting in a self deprecating manor until Hunter dragged him away to his room to stop him from hurting himself or anyone who managed to piss him off too much. At this point however Hunter was curious, what had caused him to act this way? He should probably ask.

"You keep saying that, will you please tell me why?" Alex lay in silence for a while before meekly speaking up.

"Promise not to tell anyone?" Hunter paused, why wouldn't he want Hunter to tell anyone? Well he probably had a reason so why not?

"Sure, why not." Still being a little drunk however this wasn't enough.

"No man, you gotta promise." Hunter sighed but having dealt with him all night this was rather tame.

"Yes Alex I promise not to tell anyone." Alex nodded feeling he could trust the younger teen.

"Okay so after me and Minatsuki left the party we went to my place. Then one thing lead to another and she-" Hunter quickly feeling the need to stop him cut in.

"Alex before you finish I want to remind you that the specifics of your sex life has nothing to do with and should not be shared with me." After staring blankly for about a minute Alex blinked and clarified.

"What? No we didn't have sex." Hunters raised an eyebrow and waited for him to finish "She uh.. She told me she loves me." The younger man's eyes went wide. That certainly complicated things, From what he understood Alex had every intention of keeping their arrangement open, love had never been part of the plan. But Hunter knew something like this would happen, whether that was because Shiro had hammered the idea into his head to the point where he had started to believe it himself or because their luck had started to become predictable he wasn't so sure. Either way he had at least expected the rolls to be reversed.

"Oh..."

"Yeah..." The two sat in silence for a while until Hunter spoke up again.

"What did you say?" Alex sighed before saying.

"I told her that I'd need a day to make up my mind."

"That's it? No fights, no breaking this off?" Alex looked up confused. Yet the younger teen managed to look even more confused than him. And now that he thought about it he may not have explained the situation that well.

"Well, yeah. I mean we kinda fought before that but not afterwards. She didn't stick around long enough for anything else to happen."

"You didn't do or say anything else?" He asked skeptically.

"No but she was still pretty hurt by it." Hunter thought about it. There wasn't much he could do to change the situation now really it all depended on Alex's choice.

"Well have you?" The older of the two blinked not understanding the question.

"What?"

"Have you made up your mind yet" Oh. Alex didn't find that any easier to answer.

"I don't know, I don't want to hurt her but I don't know if I'd say I love her..." Hunter nodded listening intently.

"Well tell me how you do feel about her." Alex paused trying to figure out the right way to put it. For some reason however he couldn't, for some reason it was just not possible at the moment. So he decided to wing it and just said whatever came to mind.

"It's hard to say, I know she can be pretty extreme but that's part of what I like about her. Even with all the shit she's been through instead of letting it control her she grabs life by the balls and says 'fuck you, you're my bitch now'. And I know you don't trust her and from what you know about her that's honestly the smart decision. But that's not how she always is, I've told her things that could she could easily be used as blackmail but even when she's pissed at me she keeps it to herself. Honestly she gets a bad wrap, like it really pisses me off when no one takes the time to try and get to know her and then judge her. She's amazing when you actually take the time to see who she really is." He finally stopped and took in a breath. And just like that Hunter was convinced Shiro had been right the whole time, his friends little rant hadn't been a romantic one by any stretch but there was passion behind his words. Passion he thought he'd never thought he'd see Alex use.

"It sounds like you care a lot about her." Alex nodded slowly, thinking about what he said. He knew he cared a lot for Minatsuki but after saying a little bit of how he felt out loud...

"Yeah, I do." Hunter placed his hand on Alex's shoulder getting his attention and looking into his eyes.

"Alex... Are you sure you don't like her?"

"Not anymore." God he felt even more like an asshole now. He needed to fix this and he needed to do it now. "I'm gonna go talk to her." He smiled at his friend and said. "Thanks brother." Before heading to the door. Hunter just nodded and called out.

"Anytime."

Jason slammed the file down in front of Hagire cracking the desk he sat at. He set his cup of coffee aside and picked up the file,

"What's this?" Jason's eyes burned into Hagire, he could practically feel the murderous intent from the young man

"You tell me." As he read through the file he found that there was a lot of crucial information left out. Almost as if Tamaki did so on purpose to spite him. But that wasn't possible, the man child thought he was dead. Jason looked livid, a look Hagire thought suited him. "How was I involved in over a hundred fights without my knowledge?" The director in hiding sighed and rubbed his temples, he clearly didn't want to explain this at the moment. Hell it wasn't even dawn yet.

"Jason it's a very long story and-"

"We both have plenty of time." But he didn't have a choice. After finishing his coffee he motioned to his adoptive son saying.

"Alright then, take a seat." Jason did so, his eyes never leaving Hagire's. "As the directors right hand you have many duties, some official and many unofficial. However there are many things you do not know about. That's not because of any privacy reason, there is just no point to have you involved." Jason tilted his head in curiosity. That... Didn't explain much. Actually now that he was thinking about it that answered nothing. He found this strange but decided not to push it, rather he would try to get Hagire talking naturally.

"Like these Private fights?" Hagire nodded.

"Yes, those and their participants." Jason thought for a moment and then asked.

"If I was never meant to find out about them then why was I participating in them? And how do I not remember it?"

"Tamaki." Jason raised an eyebrow at this but said nothing. "He's been undermining my authority longer than even I've been aware of. For example, putting those failed experiments in their very own Carnival Corpse."

"Failed experiments?"

"Yes, the 'Evolved'" He actually made the air quotes. "as he calls them." Evolved? Why did it sound like that had been made up off the top of his head. Oh wait, because Tamaki came up with it.

"Evolved? You mean those Deadmen with the special names?"

"Exactly. That delusional pawn thinks he has created a new, superior breed of deadmen using a more stable variant of the Redlight virus." Jason visibly flinched hearing this. That was very bad news.

"He has his hands on Redlight?" Redlight, Jason didn't know much about the virus. Only that it was the original template that Nameless Worm parasite was created from.

"A more stable version yes, It's far less powerful than the version bonded to you." That only raised more questions, for example.

"How did he get he hands on it?" Hagire paused for a moment before hesitantly admitting.

"We kept a sample in hopes of one day creating a cure. But now he is using it to breed his abominations for bloodsport." That sounded reasonable but there was still one last question.

"Okay so why have I been fighting them?"

"In truth I don't know, maybe he's been testing them to see if they can stand up to the original Deadmen." Well that settled it, he'd go to Tamaki to get the rest of the information.

"I see... Thank you for clearing this up for me." He said walking away.

Alex leaned against the wall outside Minatsuki's room. Actually he had been there for a while, so long in fact he was starting to feel like some kind of stalker. But he didn't know what to say. What if he screwed it up again? Or made it even worse? God he felt so pathetic, out of everything he had done this was what he was afraid of? No, fuck that! Forcing himself off the wall he crossed the hall and knocked on the door. He instantly regretted this action feeling nervous. Before his nerves got the better of him the door opened and Minatsuki was standing before him. They stood there in awkward silence until Minatsuki spoke up.

"Well? What do you want?" Alex flinched at her tone, she wasn't overly harsh or loud. It just felt so off coming from her.

"Hey Minatsuki, can we talk?" She sighed and turned around motioning for him to follow him in. He closed the door behind him before looking back to his friend, she sat on her bed looking at him impatiently.

"What do you want?" Alex rubbed the back of his head and thought, his hair was still to long for his liking. In the end he decided to just come out and say what was on his mind.

"Look, I've been thinking. I don't know if I'd go as far as to say it's love but I do care about you Minatsuki." The less than sane girl broke at that point she didn't need or want his pity and this was starting to feel very insulting.

"Just cut the shit and say you aren't interested. I know you aren't into me or whatever the fuck. I'm sorry I even brought it up, can we please just go back to how things were?" He sighed, okay she was taking this a bit better than he had expected. Once again he chose to be blunt saying.

"I don't know if we can. Things have changed and I don't think they're ever going to return to how they were before." With what little hopes she had left dashed she looked away.

"So what now, are we just finished altogether now?" Alex felt even worse now then he had before. Okay time to nut up or shut up, he was telling her how he felt.

"Well I was hoping we could give this whole relationship thing a shot." As the words left his mouth Her eyes went wide, had she heard him right?

"Y-you what?" Alex sat down next to her and placed a hand on her thigh.

"Like I said, I don't know about love but I do know you matter to me." He couldn't help but feel strange saying this out loud, but it felt like the right thing to say "So if you're up for it I'd like to give you and I a shot." There was a good few moments of silence before she answered.

"I'd love to!" She practically jumped on him hugging tightly as if she thought he'd disappear if let go. She then pulled away with a smirk. "And for the record that was the shittiest way to ask someone out I've ever heard." Alex let out a laugh at that before countering.

"You know damn well what you signed up for." He smirked and moved her onto his lap a wolfish grin making its way on his face. "So how are we going to celebrate?" Her smirk mirrored his own as her fingers trailed up his neck to his face holding it.

"I have a few ideas." Her hands moved down to the straps on his jacket and was about to have them undone when the door was opened suddenly. Turning around Minatsuki couldn't see Alex wave to the person who interrupted them.

"Hey Yo, what's up?" Alex was the only one amused by this situation, Minatsuki was clearly agitated and Yo... Well he had to admit he couldn't tell what Yo was thinking, the blond had one hell of a poker face. Yo sighed and half heartedly asked

"So can I get my stuff before you start to..." She glared at him for what felt like a solid minute before decided her pet dumbass would need it spelled out.

"Get the fuck out of my room."