Peace. How everyone relishes in silence and tranquility. At least until it is broken, that is.
The Shark unceremoniously barged into the Noyamano house. He expertly shrugged off the backpack and took off his ATs, all the while managing to carry the girl who was now clutching on to his shirt, and placed them near the open door. Standing at the base of the staircase, Agito started yelling for the inhabitants of the humble home.
Instead of the feminine help he desired, Ikki walked in, and moved out of the way when he saw the unconscious girl in the blue-haired boy's arms.
Ikki-kun~ His lighter half squealed, I wanna hug him! Switch the eye patch Agito!
Stop it, Akito. First lemme get this… whatever she is off me.
"Oy, women! This girl's hurt, tend to her." Agito shouted, noticing out that Ikki had moved to close the door from the corner of his amber eye.
He walked over to the living room and gently placed the lighter-blue-haired girl on the floor. The girl refused to let go of the Fang King's shirt, much to his mortification. When he grasped her smaller hand and snatched it off, she started to stir.
"So Agito… What were you doing to her?" Ikki taunted, cheekily.
Agito flushed inwardly at his implications but replied coolly in his usual harsh tone. "Nothing, you perverted asshole."
Ringo finally entered the room after running down the stairs. Mikan and Ume started to descend them slower than her.
"What happened to her? Where did you even find her?" Ringo questioned, while checking the girl's pulse.
"Magaki was torturing her in an alley," the Shark answered nonchalantly, "I just finished them off and got her here on Akito's whims."
The blue haired girl finally woke up from the commotion, and girl looked from Ikki, to Agito, to Ringo and then back at the boys. She sat up quickly, and tried to hide behind Ringo as well as possible.
"She's in shock. Those bastards must have badly toyed with her and scared the heck out of her." Mikan observed, pointedly staring at the two boys present in the room.
As usual, Ikki didn't understand… "Huh?"
"She's fucking afraid of the two of us, dumbass." Agito explained with a roll of his eye, and pulled him away from the girl to the furthest corner.
"E-Eto… Where am I?" The girl asked nervously.
"You're at the Noyamano residence." Ringo smiled warmly.
Ume walked in at that moment with a glass of water, and handed it to the unnerved girl. She eyed it suspiciously, and when she deduced there was nothing odd about it, she took the glass, smiling appreciatively. The girl managed to gulp down the entire glass in one go. She visibly relaxed, when she realized she wasn't in danger anymore.
"Can I ask you a few questions?" The girl nodded, "What's your name? What were you doing, all alone?"
The girl stiffened, and remained quiet for a few seconds. Tears were welling up in her deep blue eyes, but she remained contemplative. Once she was ready, she looked up.
"My name is Oki Yamamato. I was running away from my step-father. My father had died of cancer, and my m-mom was killed in a car-crash a few weeks ago. Since then, my step-father had been treating me horribly. So I decided to run away."
Agito immediately noticed something was amiss. The girl wasn't meeting their eyes. His days working with his brother, the police caused him to suspect that she was lying. He was broken out of his reverie by Mikan, who started munching on an apple she brought out of nowhere.
"So, how did you get here? And do you have a place to stay?" She asked between bites.
The girl- Oki hesitated again, "I used ATs..."
"YOU RIDE ATs?!" demanded an excited Ikki.
Oki hid back behind Ringo. Her eyes were firmly clasped shut and she was whimpering.
"Ikki! Go away." Ringo ordered, "I'll call you when she feels better. Agito, could you make sure he stays out?"
The former left reluctantly, and the latter was annoyed because he wouldn't be able to glean more information. Once they were in the hallway, Agito must have switched his eyepatch because they heard an "IKKI-KUN!~" and what sounded to be a crash…
The girls shook their head in exasperation and glanced back at the new comer.
Feeling their eyes on her, Oki quickly recovered and answered, "No, I don't have a place to stay… do you mind if I stay here for a while? Until I can afford to get my own apartment?"
"Oh, um no…Oki-chan," The plum haired girl didn't have the heart to send the younger girl out on the streets, "you can stay here as long as you like… Oh, by the way, I'm Ringo, This is Mikan, and Shiraume, but she prefers Ume."
Oki smiled shyly and bowed her head, causing her grimy tresses to fall around her face. "Pleased to meet you Ringo-san, Mikan-san and Ume-chan. Thank you for your kindness and hospitality. You can just call me Oki, I'm not that much into honorifics. If you don't mind me asking… where is the bath?"
Only then did Ringo notice the dirty state the blue haired girl was in. The other girls also scrunched up their noses at the stench.
Oki smiled sheepishly, as Ume guided her to the bathroom, handed a towel and told her she'd have clothes ready for her. When Oki stepped inside the tiled bathroom, she noticed that a warm bath was already drawn up for her.
She slowly stripped off her top, pants, and underclothes, and placed them in a neat pile. Oki then removed the hair tie failing to hold her hair up in a ponytail as she walked towards the tub. Gingerly, she stepped in, wincing as the warm water stung her wounds. Once she scrubbed herself clean, she started cleaning her hair of the grime and blood.
Finally understanding her predicament, she started shedding tears, muffling her sobs by biting her lip. A few minutes later, she noticed the water had gone cold, and stepped out of the bath. Oki wrapped the towel around her modestly, walked over to the sink, and washed her face of the remaining tear tracks. Watching herself in the mirror, she noticed that her hair was pristine again, and gave herself a watery smile. She nodded to herself, and stepped out, intending to walk over to the room designated for her.
A startled gasp escaped her lips, and she clutched the towel tighter to herself as she noticed the presence right behind to her.
Agito was leaning against the wall, with his eyes closed, "You really aren't vigilant are you?"
"A-ah, gomen-neh, Agito-kun?" She stuttered, realizing her state of undress, a furious blush spreading across her cheeks. She was unsure if that was his name or not, but she decided to give it a chance, as he had responded to Ringo-san when she called him that. For some reason, she felt relaxed in his presence.
Agito ignored her, and continued, "No wonder you were gonna get raped. Fuck, I had to kill those bastards… and I was gonna kill you too, but Akito begged me not to. You fainted when you saw me, so I had to fucking carry you here."
"Oh…Sorry for causing you trouble, Agito-kun" Oki said his name surely, since he didn't deny it the first time.
For the first time after her bath, he laid eyes on her, intending to quirk an eyebrow at her confident tone. What he noticed left him speechless, and caused Akito to snicker in their mind.
Oki's hair fell in silky blue tresses that looked soft and smooth to the touch. Her skin was unmarred, save for the few angry welts. The only item covering her womanly parts was a towel that in his opinion wasn't doing a proper job. Agito quickly shifted his gaze to her doe-like, deep blue eyes were staring at him in expectancy. Never in his life had he felt so flustered.
"D-don't fucking call me that! Anyway, I brought your fucking bag upstairs, since you seemed to forget about it. Fuck!" Agito threw the bag at her, which she struggled to catch, since she was holding up the tower with the other. He snaked closer to Oki, reveling in her discomfort. "I couldn't help but notice something fucked up about your ATs, so I decided to check them out."
Oki visibly stiffened at that. Her fists clenched around both her towel, and her backpack.
A smug smirk was plastered on his face as he asked her, "You're the Mist Queen of the Ocean Road aren't you?"
Oki's eyes narrowed dangerously, and her voice was filled with malice, "So what if I am?"
The Shark's wicked smirk faltered as he felt his mind going blank as he stared into those eyes which held more depth than fathomable, and almost had to stop himself from taking a step back at the other's expression.
"No harm done...I just thought that it was fucking impossible. I mean, the Ocean Regalia was destroyed a while back."
"Not exactly" Oki explained calmly, once again relaxing, "Yes, I am the Mist Queen. The regalia is different from the others. You can't battle to get the regalia, it chooses you. Also, it was never destroyed… just merely hidden."
"What's all this mumbling about!?" Ikki stepped out from one of the doors. "Already harassing the new girl, eh? Shark-scum?"
"Shut the fuck up, Crow. Or I'll send Akito to harass you." The blue haired boy snapped back at him.
Ikki smiled cheekily, "Not denying anything I see…"
Agito switched the eye patch in a quick swipe, and started to spin around, laughing. Ikki backed up into his room, and slammed the door shut. A click sounded and Akito pouted.
The cheerful blue haired boy turned around to finally greet Oki officially, but she was nowhere to be found.
The door to the room right across from his own was closed, and he guessed that the girl was finally wearing clothes, much to his amusement, and Agito's mortification.
He slipped into his own room, and started to get ready to sleep.
The night's sounds got softer and softer as tranquility once more settled in the Noyamano House.