Sorry for taking forever on this and my other fanfics guys but I hit a bit of a rut on two of my major stores (PJO and Ben 10) and I need some time to figure out the future chapters, well that and another reason I'm taking forever is I have to rewrite some chapters since my desktop decided to crash on me...sooo yeaaahhh I'll try to get what I can update this week but thanks for bearing with me so enjoy this chapter and look forward to my other stories updates, thanks!
"So I take it you failed in delivering the letter." Garrad stated stoically as he watched Zazie get bandaged up by Dr. Thunderland, one of his arms was in a slink as he scowled darkly at the indifferent man.
"I'd like to see you take on the group that attacked I doubt you'd get out as lucky as I was." Zazie shot back and winced when the corpse doctor tied the bandage hard making the cat boy wince but he continued to have the scowl. "Lag had the letter but was knocked to the ground and couldn't retaliate."
"Did you recognize any of the marauders?" Garrad asked.
"Only one, and that was because Lag shouted his name." Zazie replied almost bitterly, "it was Gauche Suede."
Aria and Dr. Thunderland Jr. froze when they heard that and looked at Zazie.
"Are you sure?" Aria asked almost breathlessly as the cat boy nodded.
"I'm positive although his attitude seemed to have change quite a bit." Zazie muttered.
"Where is seeing anyway, you fainted from your wounds and haven't had time to explain to us where he is." Dr. Thunderland said, "is he coming back through carriage?"
Zazie stayed silent but his fists were gripping the blankets of the bed tightly which just made the two adults worry about the youngest letter bee.
"Zazie what happened to Lag?" Aria asked almost scared to know the answer.
"When Gauche or…I guess I should say Noir attacked him while me and Niche were busy trying to take care of the others, he shot Lag with his own shindanju and Lag ended up….going over the edge of the cliff…" Zazie replied quietly and Aria's face paled.
"Oh no…." she said horrified, feeling terrified for her pseudo-little brother as her hands flew to her mouth.
"Did the maka girl come back up?" Dr. Thunderland implored looking at Zazie.
"no…Wasiolka and I waited probably a while for them to come up but she and Lag never did…"
"But Niche can usually catch Lag easily! Why didn't they come back up!" Aria exclaimed confused.
" Because below the bridge where we were suppose to cross there was a raging river, my best guess is that Lag and Niche must've fallen in there." Zazie replied as Dr. Thunderland finished wrapping his arm.
"So Lag Seeing is now MIA like the other letter bees…" the doctor stated, "I can't believe Seeing disappeared."
"It sounds like he's probably dead." Garrad said bluntly and was on the receiving end of three dark glares.
"You don't know that! Lag could still be alive!" Zazie hissed at him, "there is no way something like that could kill him, especially with Niche with him!"
"A maka can only do so much, no one can really win against the elements of the world." Garrad replied almost bored as he turned on his heel to walk out of the room.
"I'll prove you wrong! I'll bring Lag back in one piece!" Zazie sneered at Garrad's back.
"You will do no such thing, once you are fully recovered you will not be wasting your time searching for one letter bee when there are letters to deliver and investigations to conduct." Garrard stated.
"Screw that! I'm going to go look for Lag!" Zazie growled as Dr. Thunder and Aria had to hold him back down on the bed.
Garrard turned back around and glared at the furious cat boy.
"You have better things to do then look for your boyfriend letter Bee Zazie, you decide to waste our time by searching for him when you have a job to do then I'll have no choice but to fire you and revoke your pass." Garrad sneered freezing the group as they stared at him in shock.
"You can't do that! You're just temporarily taking over for Largo you can't fire letter bees!" Aria said.
"I have full control over the Hive and that includes running it how I see fit, if a single letter bee steps out of place then I'll fire them just like that." Garrard retorted, "that includes you and the good doctor there."
"Tch…" Dr. Thunderland grumbled, as he folded his arms angrily not happy with the situation at all.
"Now that the issue is put away I expect you to be on full duty and doing your JOB not any of this nonsense of searching for other bees." Garrard said with a tone of finality as the steel door slammed behind him, echoing throughout the room.
"This is wrong…" Aria said looking at the other two boys, "first they come, take over Largo's job, then we lose lag and find out Gauche is working for the people responsible for stealing the letters!"
"Everything is going downhill." The doctor commented as Zazie's whole body was shaking as he gripped the blankets around him tightly, he refused to shed tears but he couldn't help it as they started to form in the corner of his eyes.
"Goddammit! What did I do to deserves this!" he hissed as Aria looked at him sadly.
"Sylvette is going to be devastated…I think I'll move in with her to keep her company…she's going to need it." Aria said softly just thinking about the sensitive silver haired girl waiting for Lag to come back like always.
"That would be a good idea she could use the company." Dr. Thunderland said and noticed Zazie's head suddenly snapped up as he just realized something.
"Hey…who knows that I'm dating Lag?" he asked frowning looking between Aria and Dr. Thunderland.
"Aria-san, myself, Largo, Sylvette, Niche and Conner." Dr. Thunderland replied looking down at the dark haired letter bee, "why are you asking this?"
"Because he called Lag my boyfriend…how in the world did he know that Lag was my boyfriend when its only us that knows I've been dating him." Zazie replied.
"He's right…Garrard called Lag Zazie's boyfriend when he was leaving." Dr. Thunderland stated frowning, "how in the world did he know?"
"You don't' think he forced Largo to tell him do you?" Aria asked biting her lips, "I wouldn't put it past him to do something like that."
"Great now we have to fear of him interrogating us for information…and I still want to find Lag, some stuck up government official isn't going to stop me…" Zazie growled.
"I'd like for you to do that but try and be discreet about it alright? If anything try to go on deliveries with Conner, he'd be glad to help you find lag." Aria said as she gently pushed Zazie back against his pillows.
"Yeah…Lag is important to Conner as well, he'd want to help." Zazie sighed feeling really exhausted now after the adrenaline of yelling at Garrard diminished.
"Don't leave the bed and just sleep, your body is going to need plenty of rest to fully heal if you want to go back delivering letters and doing your search. " Dr. Thunderland stated.
"Yeah yeah…" Zazie replied rolling his eyes before he closed them.
The two adults stayed by Zazie's side making sure that he was really asleep before they left themselves.
"If he does get up make sure he stays in bed." Dr. Thunderland said to Zazie's dingo.
The giant panther nodded and curled up by the side to take a cat nap as the two left the laboratory.
"So what are you going to do now?" Dr. Thunderland asked Aria.
"I'm heading over to Sylvette's place give her the news…better give it now rather then prolong it." Aria sighed.
"I'm going to talk to Mana Jones about some relaxation herbs, Zazie may be tired now but when he's at full strength he's going to be angry most of the time without Seeing around." Dr. Thunderland said.
"Do you really think he'll take those though?" Aria asked a bit dubious about the cat boy actually using the herbs.
"He will if he doesn't want to get fired due to his anger." The corpse doctor replied as he headed down another hall as Aria headed downstairs. She passed by several letter bees who were whispering among each other and she managed to catch some snippets of the conversations.
"Hey did you hear the newest rumor floating around?"
"What?"
"That new letter bee? The cute silver haired one supposedly he's dating that Zazie."
"Eh why? And isn't haven relations with work bad? Like against the rules?"
"Technically no…its just not recommended due to it affecting your work."
"Damn I never figured those two would play for the other team.."
"What are you talking about, you admitted to mea few days ago you thought that silver haired kid was cute."
"Yeah just cute! I never said I'd want to DATE him or anything!"
"I just think its weird…two guys together."
Aria grimaced as she quicken her pace out of the hive.
'Great, now Zazie is going to have to deal with those kinds of people once he recovers as well..' she thought to herself as she walked down a familiar street, and all the way until she stopped at a house she had visited plenty of times previously. She took a deep breath and knocked on the door, she waited for a moment and heard wheels from behind the door and the door opened as Sylvette peeked out.
"Oh! Aria-san how are you?" the young girl asked smiling up at the older woman, "Have you gotten any news about Zazie and Lag?"
"A-about that…Sylvette…" Aria said not wanting to say it but knew it would be worse if she kept the information from the girl, "Sylvette sweetie…something…something happened to Lag…"
When she heard Aria say that, the smile melted off of her face and she looked worried.
"Aria what…what happened to Lag? He didn't get attacked like the others did he?" she asked her voice barely above a whisper.
The taller blonde girl bowed her head, "he and Zazie were both attacked and Lag was shot by one of the marauders and he landed….over the side of the cliff from what Zazie had told us…"
"No! Aria-san please tell me this isn't true! Lag promised! He promised he'd come back and with brother!" Sylvette cried tears already falling from her crystalline eyes.
The taller blonde kneeled down and wrapped her arms around Sylvette hugging her tightly as the girl clung up to her and buried her face in the older woman's chest and wailed.
Aria rubbed the girl's back and carried her back inside of the house with her wheelchair.
"I'm sorry Sylvette we know how you cared for him….we all did." Aria whispered not wanting to give the girl false hole.
It was already bad enough that she had lost her brother and now she had lost a good friend because of the trouble that's been going on as well.
"Why….he promised he'd come back…safe and sound with brother…" Sylvette sniffed as she wiped her eyes.
"I know…we can only just hope he comes back…Come on I'll make you a snack." Aria said gently.
The silver haired girl just continued to cling to Aria, the two girls trying to comfort each other at the loss of the young silver haired letter bee.
Meanwhile down the river close to the town of Blue notes Blues….
The raging river had calmed down when it had gotten down to the icy wasteland of the town. It was still and nothing seemed to moving, but if you looked closely you could see a shadow moving towards the shore and soon a loud gasp had broke the surface as yellow tresses of gold hair appeared as the figure walked out of the river carrying the small body of a silver haired boy close to her chest.
The figure that walked out of the water was a tall voluptuous young woman that had a small pink dress that ended on her flat stomach as grey boxers were hanging off of her curvy hips. The creature on her head let out a weak 'nuni' as he shook the water off of his fur but stayed firmly on the girl's head. The bear like arms had ripped the sleeves of the pink dress and were wrapped securely around the unconscious body.
The girl's bright blue eyes looked around the area and she got hit with the feeling of nostalgia…
"This place is familiar to Niche…Niche knows where she can go to help Lag! Hold on Steak!" the blonde girl exclaimed as she started jumping distances to reach a place she hadn't been to in several years. The maka girl continued her way until she reached a cave and entered it without any hesitation. She continued down the path until she reached a great under water pool and stood at the edge.
"Niche needs help! Niche's sister come out!" the younger of the two maka girls shouted desperately.
It didn't take long for the water to rumble and Maka appeared out of the water as the older sister appeared to the creature's side and looked surprised to see Niche in the form that was similar to her own and made her way to stand in front of her younger sister.
"What has happened to you little sister? The last time we saw each other you were tiny." The woman said, she looked at the unconscious Lag in her arms, "I take it has something to do with your companion."
"Lag got hurt bad and fell down a cliff!" Niche explained, "he got shot and Niche thinks Lag hit his head!"
"Follow me, we can take him to the healing waters." The woman replied as she hurried down the pathway to the pools she had previously used to heal her sister the last time she was here.
They soon got there and the older Maka quickly stripped Lag down to his boxers and gently placed him in the healing waters before turning to her sister.
"Its because of him you…grew isn't it sister?" she asked.
"Niche really wanted to protect Lag but was too small to do anything and she wished that she was bigger so that she could save Lag from hurt." Niche replied as she sat down on the ground, refusing to leave Lag's side, "will Lag be okay?"
"His physical wounds should be fine, his mental wounds? Well…we'll just have to see. Meanwhile since it looks like you're going to be here for a while we can get some more training in." the girl stated.
"Niche wants to be stronger! She doesn't want Lag to hurt ever again!" Niche said determined.
"Alright we can train in a bit I think you could use a rest…" Niche's sister stated before she walked away from the pools.
"Nuni…." Steak said almost sadly as he actually got off his usual perch from Niche's head and nudged Lag's arm, almost trying to urge him to wake up.
"I hope Lag wakes up soon…." Niche mumbled as she wrapped her arms around her legs as she and steak stared at the prone figure lying in the healing waters.
OoO A Few Hours Later OoO
Niche had been trying to get use to her new body and was trying out different types of weapons she could do with her hair when Steak came running out of the entrance of the pools of healing.
The younger maka girl leapt out of the water and onto the shore right in front of the small creature who was waving its tiny little arms around.
"Is lag up Steak?" She asked and when the small beast nodded she quickly picked him up and ran inside the entrance. It didn't take long for her to reach the pools where Lag was sitting up and looking around confused.
"Is lag okay?" Niche asked moving closer to the silver haired teen.
She was taken back when his one eye widened and backed away from her, as if she was frighten.
"Wh-who are you! Where am I! Where is my mother!" Lag exclaimed.
"Lag? Its Niche? Niche your dingo!" the blonde maka girl stated firmly confused to why Lag was acting like this.
"W-what? A-a dingo what's that?"
"A dingo is a partner to a letter bee! That is what Lag is!"
"I-I'm sorry but I don't remember you miss or…being a letter bee." Lag replied quietly, "in fact…I…I can't recall anything…"