A/N: Back from the depths of one place or another THAT INCLUDES COLLEGE APPS DON'T HURT ME. Anyhow, I needed a break, decided to force this out within an hour or so after at least three other rejected versions. And that's about it. Sorry for the delay. But winter break is almost coming up. If I'm lucky, I'll fit in one more update before the New Year comes around.

Chapter 16

Filai was in a bad mood.

Squalo knew that Filai was in a bad mood.

He realized that Filai was in a bad mood when Lussuria told her that she had to take another month of rehabilitation (Varia style, which is BRUTAL, I must say) to restore her wasted muscles and regain full usage of her body. She had reacted almost violently. Her hand spazzed rather painfully. She had spilt sixty four percent of her coffee over her shirt, rather than the predicted twenty point seven. The mind waves surrounding her had intensified to the point of inducing nausea. The flowers in the room did not wither and die only because they were already dead to begin with.

Filai also gave him a cookie. Tried to, at least.

"Fuck off." Squalo had stated, quite bluntly. To his surprise (or worry for the state of her mental stability), instead of pursuing the matter on grounds of him being an ungrateful bastard who should just stick his head under a guillotine, Filai had politely fed the cookie to the goldfish tank.

Turned out the cookie was poisoned. How did he find out? Well, two hours after the cookie feeding, Squalo had ended up forcing Fran to dig little graves for the K.I.A'd goldfish.

Must've been her way to relieve stress.

Anyhow, Filai must've been in a very bad mood, he later decided, so utterly confused that he didn't even notice one of Xanxus' filled wineglasses crashing into his head. He walked on ignorantly with hair sopped with grape wine. Maybe he should ask why she was in a bad mood.

In any case, the main issue at the moment was that Filai still thought she had been knocked out of active Mafia duty for about a year.

When in reality she had been knocked out of all things living and life for a little less than TEN (fucking) years.

"This is rare." Filai said.

Squalo blinked, and looked up from where Filai was sitting on her bed. "What?"

"You look like you're actually trying to think." She raised her coffee cup up slightly, as if congratulating him. I never knew you had it in you.

There was a twitch in his arm. He could feel it. "Voi, you do realize the only reason I haven't fucking spiked your head on the wall is because Luss is too busy playing nurse to cook, and Bel's scared of takeout food, right?"

So the food was the reason why they nabbed her back. How thoughtful of them, the self-centered bitches. "But I can't cook right now. I can only hold up an empty frying pan for about ten seconds max."

Squalo cringed. Details! Who the fuck needed them?

Apparently Filai did, and Squalo brandishing his sword blade in her flatly expressioned face obviously wasn't going to change things. He did so anyway, because it was good stress relief. Filai was mildly annoyed. But screw her.

"Anyway, I've been meaning to ask you. How do you stand maintaining your hair?" She pointed accusingly at his pretty soft tresses as if identifying a criminal on trial. Now that Squalo noticed, Filai's hair wasn't as horribly disheveled as it was yesterday; it was neatly pulled back in a low ponytail. Do you know how long it took me to comb my damn hair? Two hours. TWO HOURS.

Squalo paused in his mindless sword waving, thought about it, and suggested. "You just fail at being a girl."

I DON'T WANT TO HEAR THAT FROM YOU! "I'm going to cut my hair as soon as I—"

Slice.

Filai stopped.

Squalo blinked. It must've been the twitch. His left hand had slipped slightly. Just very, mildly, ever so slightly. Barely noticeable, except, well, not barely. Just, uh, really, really noticeable. Partially because his hand had angled a bit at an odd direction, but mostly because—

She sighed a very exasperated sigh, as if attempting to swallow all her murderous impulse and convert it into some boundless sea of patience and forgiveness and no, that didn't really work out too well. Since it's Filai. Squalo, you did that on purpose, didn't you?

"Uh," Squalo said intelligently, as he stared blankly at the fluttering jagged edges of Filai's now horribly curtailed hair. The rest and majority had spilled gracelessly over the bed. He stood up resignedly. "I'll go get the superglue."

LIKE HELL I WANT TO GLUE MY HAIR BACK, YOU IDIOT.

He thought about it. She was right. Superglue might come off in the shower. Then again, he was Superbia Squalo. He could make it work. Oh, wait. He had a better idea. "Luss should have a sewing machine somewhere—"

Filai seemed very ready to call the psycho ward on him. YOU CAN'T SEW HAIR BACK!

"We've got bandages in the first aid kit—"

Something seemed to snap in Filai. GO RUN IN FRONT OF AN ARMY TANK.

So this what he gets for being fucking considerate for a change? And people wonder why he loved being a bastard. Screw this civilized shit. He gave up. "VOI! YOU WANTED A GODDAMN HAIRCUT IN THE FIRST PLACE! WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU COMPLAINING?"

I WAS TALKING ABOUT SOMEONE WITH ACTUAL HAIR CUTTING CREDIBILITY, YOU HALF WIT. NOT SOME MACHETE WIELDING SEXUALLY AMBIGUOUS ASSHOLE WITH VAGUE GENDER DISTINCTIONS.

"VOI! WHY DO YOU ALWAYS HAVE TO COME BACK TO THE GODDAMN VAGUE GENDER DISTINCTIONS?"

BECAUSE IT'S TRUE! Oh shit— Filai ducked as Squalo threw a chair at her.

Only to accidentally fall backwards and topple off her bed. The crash was much music to Squalo's ears. "Ow." Pause. "T-that was a cheap shot." And then. "You do realize you're a bitch, right?"

"Yeah." Squalo walked around the bed, bending down as he easily dragged Filai up from the ground. She was light. Unhealthily so. "You're not eating."

"Yes I am." Filai pointed to the wastebasket in the room, which was filled to the top with empty chicken soup cans. She caught Squalo's deadpan look. "What? Something wrong?"

He thought about it. "Yeah. You." Without further ado, he shoved her over his shoulder. She floundered rather pathetically like rubber. Curse this muscle deterioration. Bits of hair still floated drearily from the edge of her still connected hair. "You need to eat more. We're going to the kitchen."

"But I like chicken soup." Filai objected. "It's healthy."

"You need to eat something else." Squalo stated flatly.

"I don't want to."

"You don't have a choice."

"Yes I do."

Squalo thought about it. Force feeding probably wasn't the best solution in this case, since the last time he tried to force feed one, the unfortunate victim had ended up dead (it didn't help that the food was poisoned). Then an idea came to mind. He dropped her back onto her bed. "Wait a minute." He told her and stalked out of the room.

A while later, he came back and shoved a heated can of chicken soup into Filai's hands. She stared at him. "What is this?"

"What the fuck does it look like?"

"I thought you didn't want me to drink any more chicken soup."

He glared at her venomously, once again angrily waving his sword around in emphasis. "Just drink it, goddamn it!"

Deciding that trying to understand Squalo's train of thoughts wasn't going to help her mental stability, Filai stared down at the soup. She frowned. "Hey," She briefly looked back up at him. "I don't have a spoo..."

Her voice drifted off.

What the fuck.

Maybe she was hallucinating. Or was this some twisted dream? Did Lussuria give her too much drugs? Was this what it's like to be high? Or maybe she was just going crazy, because why in the world was Squalo holding a live chicken in front of her face?

Aside from the chicken's squawking, the silence hung like a dead weight in the room. Squalo was looking rather triumphant, for whatever reason his crackpot mind had conceived. Filai wondered if all those glasses to the head he had taken over the years had finally caused his mind to break.

Minutes ticked by.

Finally. "S-Squalo, what are...you...doing?" Filai had to struggle to force the words out. She had surely developed some psychosomatic issue that had caused her speaking ability to cease its proper functions. It must be the trauma. Or maybe a stroke. Or maybe a heart attack. Was she going to die of a heart attack at such an early age?

Brows scrunching at the question, Squalo shook the forlorn chicken around. It gave a complaining cry. "Voi, isn't it obvious, fucktwit?" He snapped as-a-matter-of-factly. "You think the chicken's cute, don't you?"

Filai's mind was at shattering point. D-did Squalo just say "cute"? As in Superbia Squalo? That's it. A stroke. She must be getting a stroke now. S-so people start hallucinating when they're dying, huh? This is how it's like to be on the verge of death? Or was this some divine punishment for being a complete bastard over the course of her life? Maybe it wasn't too late to repent. I see now. I was too evil over the course of my life. I now see the error of my ways. Please forgive me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

Puzzled at her state of near catatonic shock, Squalo waved a hand in front of her face. "What the hell's wrong with you?"

So it's true. I'm going to die early. Here. And now.

"Voi, are you listening?"

I haven't even made a will yet. Maybe if I scrape up a quick one in my mind right now, I can die in peace. U-uh, Tsunayoshi kun can have my biology textbooks. Bel can have the kitchen knife set that's not really mine. Squalo can have my copy of Black Ops, even though I haven't even gotten around to opening it yet. I'm sure even his stunted mind can enjoy the zombie mode. He could relate—

"DON'T FUCKING INSULT ME LIKE I'M NOT HERE, YOU ASSHOLE!"

She ignored him. Please give me another chance. I'll donate to charity. I won't call my dad a bitch ever again, even though he deserves it. I'll never attack Tsunayoshi kun with hot coffee ever again. I'll be a good person. Please forgive me—

Squalo dumped a bucket of ice over her head.

"..." Filai blinked as ice slid down her head and shirt. She was not pleased. Just where did you get that?

He shrugged, tossing the empty bucket aside. "You were busy saying sorry to whoever the fuck you were talking to. You probably didn't notice me leave." Sitting back down, he resumed waving the poor chicken around in front of her. "Anyway, this should've worked by now."

Filai was on the verge of a breakdown. "Just what are you trying to do? We've known each other for years. If you wanted to kill me, you could've at least chosen a less painful way. Like beheading, or shooting. Or lethal injection!"

"What the fuck are you talking about?" Squalo said confusedly. The chicken flopped haplessly in his grip. "I'm just trying to get you to stop drinking chicken soup and eat something else."

That makes no sense whatsoever.

Squalo groaned, rolling his eyes. "Fine. I'll fucking explain it to you, since you're too stupid to understand yourself." He gestured at the chicken. "You're supposed to think the chicken's cute. So you'll get attached to it. Then you'll look down at your chicken soup and realize that the soup is probably made out of this chicken's cousin or something. Then you'll feel guilty. And then you'll never touch chicken soup ever again! Got it?"

Dead silence.

Squalo shifted uncomfortably "W-what?"

Pause. Filai resisted the urge to hit her head on something hard. "Squalo. That was the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life."

Squalo threw the chicken at her.

"Wow, Senpai." Fran was in awe. He shot Filai two thumbs up. "You got a good haircut. You look at weird as ever."

Somehow, Filai didn't see any reason to be pleased with that remark. She bleakly tugged on one of her erratic side bangs, which trailed slightly longer than the other side. There had been enough length to tie part of her hair back, but much of it was fringes and bangs too short to be tied up. So now they hung rather painfully in front of her face and eyes, like little needles bent on poking her eyes out.

Squalo, the bastard. Why was it always his fault that her hair got so screwed up? Some sick irony this is.

"Do you need something, Fran?"

Fran sat down on the chair next to her head, frog covered head tilting curiously. "Nothing really. I was just wondering if stupid long hair senpai," This guy's nicknames were just getting lamer and lamer. "told you how long you were gone from the Varia."

How long I was gone? "He didn't tell me specifically, but I personally estimate it's a little less than a year." Filai said. "Why, is there something that happened since then?"

Thoughts ran through Fran's head. Something like, rise of Millifiore, all out Mafia war, near destruction of Vongola, death of Vongola Nono AND Decimo, dwindling of Vongola alliance, death of almost all Acrobelano, destruction of Vongola rings, etc. He should make a list. Fran shrugged and said flatly. "No, not much."

And life moved on.

"Speaking of which, Filai senpai. I heard you were in a bad mood in the morning." He said thoughtfully. "Did something happen?"

"Bad mood?" Pause. "Oh, right. That, I wouldn't necessarily call it bad mood." She said, bleakly sipping from her coffee cup. How in the world did coffee manage to taste stale? That couldn't be right. "It was more like I had a bad feeling. Purely intuitive, so it died off by itself. Why?"

Fran nodded, as if confirming something. "As I thought. It wasn't because it's that time of the month again, was it?"

Filai spat out her coffee. WHY IS IT YOU PEOPLE ALWAYS ASSUME THAT THAT'S THE REASON? IS THIS SOME FORM OF SEXISM OR SOMETHING?

He was defensive. "According to my master, that's the number one likely reason for females' bad moods. Of course, master isn't a girl himself, biologically at least. So I'm not sure how he knew." Though he did lock himself up in a girl's body for a while. Maybe that had something to do with things. "Speaking of which, I wonder how you dealt with your period when you were locked up in the Vendi—" He stopped. "Oops. I wasn't supposed to say that."

"Vendi?"

Pause. "Oh, by vendi, I mean—" Fran paused, deep in thought. "Ven-vendi, uh, vending..."

Another pause. "Vending?"

"Machine." Silence. Fran repeated with more confidence than he should be having in this kind of situation."Vending machine. You were in a vending machine. You know, the drink machine with the sodas and stuff. Yours had a Coco Cola logo on it. With a gerbil mascot." Pause. "It was a brown gerbil. It had sunglasses." He caught Filai's stare, and said almost resignedly. "You don't believe me, huh Senpai?"

WHO THE HELL WOULD BELIEVE THAT BULLSHIT, YOU FROG EATEN BASTARD?

Hallway

This was bad. She was definitely going to suspect something now.

After his grand escape (which involved a lot of turtles and bricks and hotdogs on a stick; explosive hotdogs), Fran skidded to a stop in a more isolated part of the mansion. He glanced behind his shoulder. Nobody was around. Sighing tiredly, he seated himself neatly on the floor before lightly patting his hand against the side of his head. "Master, are you there?"

Kufufu. So you have news, useless student of mine. The disembodied voice rang in his head like some creepy loud speaker directly to the ear. Fran sighed. It was getting sad how natural it was beginning to feel. What is it?

"You lied, Master." Fran complained. "A period isn't the root of all women related evil. Filai senpai said so. As I thought, you're the kind who likes to brag about your knowledge without anything backing you up."

The voice's response was wry. You do realize that my imprisonment is the only thing that's keeping you alive at the moment.

Fran nodded, despite his master not being able to see it. "Exactly. That's why I'm trying to fit in as many insults as possible while I still can. I hope you understand, Master. It's because you're really annoying, so I have to do it no matter what. Anyway." He added quickly before his master could reply with more threats of eternal pain. "Senpai still hasn't realized that she's been in a coma for ten years. You never told me how stupid she was."

No, I believe it was less her stupidity than the rest of the Varia's. Mental damage is a contagious phenomenon, after all.

"Oh? Master, did you just defend Senpai?" Fran asked in mild surprise. "That's rare, isn't it?"

His master scoffed, as if the very notion was nigh blasphemous. Don't be mistaken, idiot apprentice. I wasn't defending her intelligence. I was insulting the Varia's. Yours included, of course.

"No, that was undeniably an attempt at defense." His student stubbornly confirmed. "And if you're so annoyed about us not telling her, then why don't you do it? I'm sure you can easily access her mind like you can for me and that one girl with the eyepatch."

For a few seconds, there was no response from his master. Finally, I'd rather not waste my time on such a trivial matter.

Fran flatly clicked his tongue. "Master, you're currently stuck in a pickle jar. How can you have anything else to do except raid Hibari Kyouya's mind with weird pink flowery and sparkly images?"

It's NOT a pickle jar, foolish apprentice. His voice had an edge of annoyance ominously lacing his words. It's a prison cell.

"Filled with water and preservative chemicals and other unnamable liquids." Pause. "In other words, a pickle jar. From the pictures you sent me, the liquid's even green sometimes, with the right lighting. You're essentially like a pickled pineapple, aren't you, Master?" He wrinkled his nose. "That sounds sort of gross. At least you don't have to worry about anyone eating you—"

Mukuro Rokudo mentally sent a trident spearing straight through Fran's frog hat. And possibly head.

"Ah, Master. You've revealed your identity—"

Shut up.

And thus, Fran continued on with life, without skipping a beat, the impressive little frog head he was. "Anyway, it seems that everyone's too scared to tell Filai senpai the truth. Boss is too lazy, Bel senpai and Levi senpai wouldn't do it either, Lussuria senpai insisted on shoving the job to Squalo senpai, and Squalo senpai just can't spit it out. Is Filai senpai that scary?"

Oh, of course. You haven't been thoroughly acquainted with her S+M fetish, have you?

"Huh?"

Filai flopped miserably on her bed, staring up at the white ceiling as her mind wandered back to the strange gut feeling she had been harboring in the morning. She had ignored it at first, but then Fran had brought it back to mind with that little spat of theirs. Now it was back and, judging by how long it's been around, more persistent than before.

She wanted to go for a walk. Except she really shouldn't, mostly because her legs were busy being wasted, and she had expended most of the energy she could afford today. Lussuria's odd peacock treatment had sped up her recovery rate considerably, but even a giant bird with cell activating properties could only so much when it came to muscle decay. Filai wasn't sure of the exact time span, but by now she had figured that maybe her coma had lasted longer than just one year.

For some reason, nobody would tell her anything. Maybe they just wanted to catch her when her mouth is full or something, so she'd choke on her food. The assholes they were.

Geh, the bad feeling, bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling. I want to hit something. Except I'll probably only end up hurting myself instead. Of course, I can barely lift my arm for that long anyway. Usually she'd at least have a rough idea as to what was annoying her. But in this case, it was literally coming out of nowhere.

Bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling.

She was going to visit Xanxus.

It was the only option she had, now that Squalo was too busy acting weird to dish out information. Bel, Levi, and Lussuria were ruled out before they even made it to the list. Fran obviously couldn't keep a conversation halfway without either digressing or making her lose her temper. Her second choice normally would've been Marmon, but after these few days, she hadn't seen him at all. She highly doubted the infant would just miraculously appear when she needed him.

And, as much as she hated to admit it, spoiled personality and drunken habits aside, Xanxus could be classified as one of the saner members of the Varia. Or, no, sane wasn't the right word. At least he had simpler tastes in life; he liked alcohol, violence, sleeping, and himself. It made his mood swings a bit easier to predict.

So when Filai finally managed to half stumble half drag herself to Xanxus' room, she was much relieved to find him armed with tequila. His favorite drink. He's probably in a not bad mood right now. Or, maybe he was at least too wasted to aim furniture properly. She really wasn't in a state to dodge right now.

He spotted her at the door, and he scowled irately. "What do you want, trash?"

You'll never learn manners, will you? "Uh, not much. I just wanted to ask some things."

Xanxus paused, as if deciding whether or not he was in the mood to grace his hapless subordinate with any answer at all. But he was high on tequila and he hadn't had to touch any paperwork at all, thanks to the fucking shark. He'll relent today, and only today. "Make it quick."

Inflated ego all the way. Filai sighed. "Thanks, I guess." So, let's see. "I wasn't held at the Viavideche HQ. So where was I the whole time?"

His answer was unhesitant and merciless. "Vendicare."

The Vendicare? Oh right, that infamous Mafioso joint with the water prisons. Now that she thought about it, the Vendicare prison could be analogous to a vending machine. Except instead of holding cans of soda, the prison held cans of killer Mafioso. She was even sure that people can bail prisoners out with enough money (as in, REALLY ENOUGH); maybe they had slots for the billion dollar checks to be inserted into. Oh wait a moment.

T-THE VENDICARE? Filai would've spat out her coffee again, if she had any in her mouth. "What was I doing THERE?"

Shrugging, Xanxus took another graceless draught from his glass. To this day, Filai still wondered why he hadn't died from alcohol poisoning. "Floating in water and preservatives. What else is there to do in that shithole?"

But WHY?

He shot her a burning glare, and Filai immediately shut up. "Like I'd give a fuck what happened."

In other words, he didn't know. He could just say it flat out. "But the Vendicare's a lot more dangerous than the Viavideche." Yet you somehow dragged me out. Should I be touched?

"I don't like owing people." Xanxus stated simply.

Wow, that almost made you sound like you had a conscience. Or are you just that wasted? A couch whizzed past her ear. Alright, alright, it was the conscience. You know, if you want people to say that honestly, it wouldn't hurt to have some human decency once in a while. "What do you mean by owing?"

"Figure it out yourself."

And Filai took a moment to do so. Owing, owing, since when was Xanxus ever in debt to her? Maybe when Xanxus couldn't get into the sealed room the 9th was in during the Cradle Affair and she had managed to crash a helicopter through it? No, that was too long ago. He would've tried repaying her earlier if that was it. The cooking? So far, all evidence for a reason points to her cooking.

Or maybe, "You mean the deal the 9th made with me before I left?"

No answer from her boss. You could just move your jaws for once and say yes.

"Go fuck off."

THAT TOOK EVEN MORE EFFORT THAN SAYING 'YES', DIDN'T IT?

Speaking of which, the 9th's plan had been a strange proposal. Made sense in retrospect, of course, because otherwise she would've tried to shoot the old man rather than agree, but it just didn't seem like the type of plan that the 9th, or Sawada Iemitsu would've thought of. Especially considering how they barely knew she existed before said incident.

The basics were simple. They thought that tensions would ease between the Viavideche and the Vongola if the Vongola sent her back, like a peace offering of sorts. If she agreed, then the Varia could be free of treason charges and all will be happy.

Of course, she never really considered the fact that her dad was such a bitch until it was too late. Oh well.

"As always, you're too soft." Xanxus said irately. "Some fucking Mafioso you are."

And you're very welcome, dear ungrateful bastard. Filai gloomily shook her head at her boss' tenacity, before offering a half hearted shrug. "Well, to be honest, I don't really regret much, so I don't mind being a terrible Mafioso. After all, if I fill my schedule shooting people, I wouldn't have time for schoolwork and domestic slavery."

Xanxus snorted.

"That's all I needed." Since you seem to be deprived of the rest of the info I wanted. And I think I'm about to faint right now. She turned to leave, but stopped at the doorway. She glanced back at the Varia's boss. Looking at him always reminded her how the Varia never seemed to change. The nostalgia. Ah, I think I'm tearing up.

Xanxus caught her staring, and flashed back a vicious death look. "What?"

That jerked her out of her thoughts. She shook her head, suddenly feeling better than she had all day. Nothing. She clumsily ducked out of the room.

Xanxus as a counselor. She must be insane.

Right outside, she saw Squalo walking through the corridor. She might've been delusional, but he was clutching what appeared to be a stuffed animal. A chicken stuffed animal, to be horrifically specific.

He stopped as he passed her, looking rather confused. "Voi, what the fuck were you doing?"

Just asking the boss something.

"You're alive?"

Filai was smug. "I'm smart enough to catch him in a good mood." Before Squalo could object, she pointed almost warily at the stuffed animal in his hand. "Don't tell me you haven't given up that half wit plan of yours."

"SHUT UP." Squalo hissed, and subsequently shoved the stuffed animal into her face. "I'm going to fucking duct tape this piece of shit to your face the next time you even touch your fucking chicken soup."

Again with the chicken soup. Since when did Squalo become an expert on food nutrients anyway? He was an assassin. He chopped stuff up and yelled a lot. Food advice just wasn't in his field of expertise, and even if it was, she was not going to take it from someone who nommed on raw fish.

Filai wanted to facepalm as Squalo waved the innocuous stuffed chicken in front of her, spewing death threats and whatnot. Even though this was one of the rare times when Squalo's intentions were actually halfway decent (unless he was doing this just to piss her off, which she really wished was the case), this was getting kind of sad. "Hey, Squalo." She stated deadpan. You're my mom, aren't you?"

On cue, the chicken stopped waving. Squalo was much confused. His mind probably still hasn't successfully decoded the words yet, or else he would've put a crater through something by now. "...what?"

"Nothing. You're hallucinating."

"Did you just—"

Hey. She began poking him relentlessly. "You came at a good time. I'm tired. Carry me back."

Squalo growled in frustration, thankfully abandoning the previous issue that was completely true no matter how much he denied it. "Voi! I'm not your fucking slave!"

Neither is my car. Well, if I had one.

"I hate you." Squalo said, rather immaturely. Reluctantly, he bent down and lifted her onto his back. Piggy back! The mom theory was getting more validity by the moment. Not that she said that out loud. "What the fuck were you doing here at this time anyway?"

"I just said, I was asking Xanxus some things." Filai felt sleepy; the fatigue that she had managed to ignore up until now was catching up. And Squalo's back was comfortable. That didn't help. "You didn't seem like you wanted to tell me anything."

"And what made you think the boss would?" Squalo grumbled.

She poked him again, rather mercilessly. Divine punishment for asking stupid questions! "Obviously because he was someone who wasn't afraid of giving me psychological trauma." Unlike you who just couldn't spit anything out. I'd usually thank you for the gesture, but this time it was a bit inconvenient.

Squalo might've stumbled over his feet at that. She could feel his shoulders cringing in some humiliated misery at the blunt statement as if it were a stab in the stomach. Should she be enjoying this as much as she was? "Go die in a hole."

Filai ignored that. "It's fine, isn't it?" She pointed out as-a-matter-of-factly. Since you're being cute right now.

As always, her definition of cute was completely off mark. No wonder the chicken didn't work on her. "And anyway, I thought you only liked stuff with shit like blood on them!" Squalo protested. "I'm not covered with blood right now, damn it!"

As if she really wanted to argue about that. As expected of the idiot shark, he just couldn't leave things alone when they should be. That's right. You're not covered with blood right now. Then again, you're also a self-centered, arrogant, idiotic lunatic with homicidal tendencies and vague gender distinctions. BUT nevertheless I said you're cute because you're cute and as far as I can see, that's all there is to it.

To be brutally honest, how the fuck was he supposed to argue with that logic? No wait, that wasn't something he could call logic. But theoretically wouldn't that mean that in Filai's eyes, he was cuter than a chicken? He didn't want that kind of notion in his head! In fact, why was he even thinking about this?

Blissfully unaware of Squalo's raging mental debate, Filai's mild trailed back to her conversation with Xanxus. Now that I think about it, I forgot to ask him something thing. "Hey." She tapped Squalo on the shoulder. "So exactly how long was I in the Vendicare for?"

"VOI! DID YOU SERIOUSLY LEAVE THE HARDEST QUESTION FOR ME?"

Filai winced. He was too near her. Her eardrums. Just answer the question already.

Reluctantly reducing his voice to disjointed profanity and whatnot, Squalo resorted to glaring at the floor in front of him. After an uncomfortable moment of silence, he muttered something under his breath. "...en years."

As if I can hear what you said.

"Ten years."

Pause. "Eh?"

Squalo sputtered angrily "Voi! Why do you have to make me say it again?" No answer, and he twitched. "Fine. FINE. I'll fucking say it one more time! You've been gone for ten fucking years, and let me tell you now! Any amount of complaining or bullshit isn't going to change it! So don't start—"

Slide.

THUD.

Filai promptly fell off his back. Squalo winced as she made a nice and cracked collision with the ground. M-my biology degree. That might've left a bruise or two. Th-this...isn't...funny. Arg, bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling bad feeling.

Squalo gingerly prodded her shoulder with his foot. There was no movement. Apparently she had fainted. Sighing, he ran a tired hand through his hair, looking around the empty hallway as if expecting someone to come and deal with the mess.

He looked back down, and raised an eyebrow.

She took it better than he expected.

Ending Note: And because I did this in a hurry, it was more of a filler-ish chapter than anything. Things will probably start moving on in the next one, if I get it all organized. I need to go resort the timeline before I write it. Thank you for reading.