Disclaimer: I don't own Professor Layton or Claire or anyone else in this story, they belong to Level 5 games and nobody else!
Learning how to love.
Claire walked home alone with a lowly, patchy umbrella hovering over her to shelter her from the rain hammering down all around her.
Late dusk had arrived early, covering everything in the darkness of the night and there was only the old lanterns hanging by people's houses to light up the depressing atmosphere as she felt her shoes flood and her clothes and hair become absolutely soaking wet from the heavy amount of moisture hanging in the air around her.
She had a slight hop in her step as she tried to do anything and everything to prevent herself from getting anymore soaked by the rain that was absolutely pouring down. She didn't even realise that the heavens had been opening since the minute both Hershel and herself had been pardoned from the school grounds after some stuff about Hersh needing to head off to work and her parents wanting her home.
Claire gave a thoughtful hum as she slowly eyed her surroundings, feeling cornered all of a sudden. She felt like a deer whom had vicious predators maliciously circling her like the cornered prey she was in that visualised situation. But she decided to press onwards encase she was just being paranoid.
Pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose, she walked on through the dark of night with her soaking wet school bag wrapped around her shoulder. Her eyes squinted as huge drops of rain began to plummet down and drop evenly upon the lens of her glasses, caking them in drops of water and obscuring her vision in the process.
Because of this, and walking blindly, she accidently wandered into an alleyway.
When she stopped for a moment to clean her glasses, making certain that she was taking some shelter, she found that she had done this as she gazed at her surroundings with fear etched deeply on her round face and her mouth was formed into a little 'o' as she backed slowly away to step back into the rain.
However suddenly something snagged Claire by the wrist, making her drop her umbrella as she gasped in shock, and she found that she was looking right into the eyes of a maniac.
It was a boy older then she was and he was surrounded by a pack of other boy's whom decided to surround her just encase she wanted to get away. They all wore cruel grins as they all blocked her path in a ring of this group. Each and everyone of them were cloaked in the shadows as they glared daggers at her through glowing yellow eyes that shone through the joint darkness of the alleyway and night.
Those eyes vaguely reminded Claire of those intimidating wolves that usually star in classic cartoon films and chase the main character in a dark and spooky woodlands.
Claire shivered but she didn't know whether it was from fear or from the cold of the night. Either way, she didn't care.
"Where are you going, little lady?" The leader which grabbed Claire's wrist asked smugly.
She couldn't answer.
Every word she wanted to speak was caught in her throat as her lower lip quivered in fear while tears welled up inside her big, round eyes. She was very much afraid of what was happening here, her heart was beating about three thousand miles a minute and she couldn't hope but feel all the colour drain from her face and leaving it chalk white.
With a shaky voice, she demanded while fighting to get the boy to release her wrist "L-Let me g-go!"
The man only grinned wider upon seeing the young lady struggle. It was like he expected a bit of a fight from her, and he was enjoying each and every second of observing her trying to get away from him as he gripped her wrist even tighter in joy.
The shadowed boy began cackling with a wicked intent.
He turned his head to face the other boys and he asked through a very slimy, sly tone "My, my, a fighter this one. What say we 'play' with her a bit?"
Claire stopped struggling. She looked worriedly around her as she noticed the boy's advance her until she felt really claustrophobic. Tears began to pour down her face as she began to realise exactly what they were going to do with her and she slowly backed into a corner and gave one last attempt to try and get them to leave her be.
"P-P-Please, leave me alone..." She dropped to her legs and started sobbing out of fear and she squeezed her eyes shut to brace herself for the abuse sent her way.
She felt weak and useless. Usually she was way feistier than this but her weaker side took over, making her feel scared and alone. She could hear the rumbling of the thunder above in her ears as lightning clapped, temporarily blinding everyone for a split few seconds before it finally subsided into thin air.
It was then she realised that nothing was happening. Did they just stop for some reason?
She opened her eyes reluctantly, terrified as to what would behold her when she fully opened them, but she gasped at who she saw standing in front of her with a sabre in hand and they looked soaking wet to the bone.
"H-Hershel?!" She sniffled, her eyes widening immensely as she saw the back view of her friend.
Hershel Layton paid no mind to Claire but he stood defensively in front of her, an angered look on his face as lingering raindrops poured down his head. He glared right into the eyes of those boy's who wanted to harm Claire and they seemed pretty frightened themselves, clearly afraid that another boy had joined the party.
Layton gave a stiff growl as he expertly twirled the blade in his hands while it was pointed towards them.
"You keep your filthy fingers off of her!" Hershel growled.
He adjusted his stance so he could be standing in front of Claire, distancing her from the boy's cloaked by the shadows, and he gave the most sternest look imaginable as he narrowed his little black eyes and frowned. He watched as the boy's sneakily tried to go around the young lad sporting the chestnut brown Afro but he was on his guard and whipped his body in their direction.
He was clearly very much tentative to each movements the boys made for the young lady.
Layton used one hand to dust off his filthy red school vest and he resumed trying to intimidate the bullies so they would leave the poor terrified girl alone.
Should they try and threaten Claire, he was going to make sure that they don't even look at her before he struck like a cobra. He would rather be injured himself then let any harm come to a young lady in trouble. He may have been sour lately but that didn't exactly mean that he was heartless.
The leader of the pack dived at Hershel in an attempt to fight him but he quickly dodged the pathetic attack and smacked the hilt of the sword he clutched down on his noggin.
And all at once the professor-to-be was surrounded.
Layton fought them off, a full fit of fury making him whip his sword about in a frenzy as he tried to disarm each and every one of them. He grunted and pivoted on the balls of his heels as he tried his best to attack and he even twirled on the spot when he sliced the material of one of the boy's woollen black jumpers.
He shown nobody a shred of mercy. He cut the pack down one-by-one as he charged at them and he swung his fencing sword at them, just barely knicking the soft velvet clothing each and everyone of these wolffish adversaries. He gave continuous grunts of effort as he fought each and every one of those fools off.
It took about ten minutes or so but eventually all of the boy's were cut down unconscious. They were all now lying on the cold hard concrete of the alley with no signs of quick recovery.
Panting for a minute to wait for his breath to catch up with him, Hershel very slowly turned around and looked down at Claire.
The poor lass was still traumatised out of her mind as she shuddered against the wall, still on the floor as she stared into nothing but into space.
She had a very cold sweat dripping from down her face but that could be the rain as either way, but her breathing was very shallow and her pupils shrank and grew in dilation. Claire trembled and shook and her voice was no longer working to provide any good verbal communication and, after moments of a frozen fear, her eyes rolled into the back of her head and she fell into a deep unconsciousness that was remarkably similar to her attackers.
"Claire!" Hershel gasped, quickly grasping her hand to check for a pulse.
He sighed in relief. A pulse was there; weak but still present.
Getting down to meet her on eye level, Hershel carefully gathered the unconscious girl into his arms as he stood up on his own two feet.
Actually, surprisingly, she wasn't that heavy. She was actually very light in his sturdy arms as she lain limp inside them. Hershel looked down at her face whilst he used a free hand to wipe a strand of her soaking wet red hair out of her eye before he looked off into the distance in deep thought.
It wouldn't do any good to just leave her out here and it wouldn't be healthy to just stay in this soaking wet alleyway where both of them could catch cold.
He was on his way to work with his fencing equipment that he had picked up from the assembly hall at school earlier when he heard spotted her wandering blindly into this alley and he decided to follow her to check if she was alright after noticing that she was taking an awful long time to get out of there.
Sighing with a shake of the head, it was decided: Claire should stay at his house tonight.
He didn't exactly know where she lived and he doubted that he could leave out at any old house where she would feel afraid. His house would be the logical choice here, unfortunately.
He would have to go straight to work and leave her with his parents, though...
"Come on, you..." Hershel muttered beneath his breath as he carried Claire through the rain with his fencing sword strapped into his belt holster and he wandered alone into the pitch black night with the rain becoming even heavier.
Exiting the alley, the young lad carrying Claire's limp form began to take the lonesome route home.
Another clap of thunder struck the whole of Stansbury as Hershel Layton carried the young lady all the home bridal-style with his footsteps being the only noise vibrating through the heavy, moisture-laden air. The two school students had no idea what else was going to happen.
He even seemed to have forgotten to bring Claire's umbrella along.
A/N: Awww, Hershel saved Claire...although he seemed to have been very reluctant on doing this for some reason. Maybe he was just not comfortable on the idea of bringing a girl home and giving his parents a heart attack.
But, anyway, let's see where this leads...
When will Hershel go from Stansbury, you may ask? You shall find this out later.
-Chloemcg