Disclaimer- I don't own Negima.

Hi! Much quicker update, if anyone's still reading. I like this chapter considerably more than the last, which I've edited so it's now so awful anymore. If you don't know who Filius Zecht is, I'm not entierely sure how you can know who Albireo Imma is (except through the Budokai), because they were both in Ala Rubra. I think this makes sense either way.

I enjoyed writing it, and I hope you enjoy reading it. :)

"Welcome, ladies." greeted Al.

"You better have a good story for us today. Yesterday's was weird and random," complained Chisame. "One day you were talking about truck driving in America and the next you were a geisha. There has to be a connection, a interlacing plot. Otherwise it's just weird."

"Hmm...what would you like to hear?"

Asuna thought about it. "Have you always been so calm and com...comn...what's the word?"

"Composed?" finished Konoka.

"Yeah, that's it."

"Have I? No, there was a time when I was a very different man, one I'm not very proud of. Of course, one must always come to the realization that you are being foolish."

"Can we hear that story?" asked Konoka eagerly.

"If you really want to. This was quite a long time ago, though, it may take me a moment to remember...let's see...It was a little town, dirty and slowly sinking into the sea due due to lack of sewer and drainage...on the coast of Italy. I believe it's now called Venice."

Chisame couldn't help mumble something condescending, but her eyes were trained firmly on Al's teacup, listening to every word.

Al slowly whittled the piece of wood with a rough knife he had found. He grazed his skin again, causing his hand to bleed for what felt like the twentieth time. Who knows, it probably was. His blurry eyes weren't really trained on the wood or the lank hair in his eyes or even the ground in front of him. He wasn't thinking, because if he did it would mean remembering that he wasn't dead, that last month had marked the thirty-eighth time he'd attempted suicide.

He could hear people passing him in the street, but he didn't care. He never spent any time with people now. It was too depressing, looking at someone and knowing that they would be dead before Al had even noticed. Even in the throes of passion he would look at whatever person he was with and see only the age and death approaching them.

He hated civilization, but he had stumbled upon this town and had had no reason to leave, no reason to go anywhere. He was just as filthy as they rest of them, his clothes ragged and pieced together, his hair matted and stiff. His hands and face were caked with dirt and probably blood, he just hadn't checked lately. He sat there and whittled away the wood until all he was cutting were the tips of his fingers and a small sliver that would only be suitable as a toothpick.

His stomach rumbled, but he ignored it. He didn't need to eat anymore. Sure, it was painful, but wasn't everything?

He felt someone kick his leg. He glanced up with bloodshot eyes to see a young boy, maybe ten or eleven, looking at him with a blank face. Something was different about this boy, something Al couldn't quite place. He blinked blearily, and the boy kicked him again. Then it clicked. This boy was clean. His face was washed, and his white hair was glossy with the result of painstaking care. His clothes, while not extravagant, were stitched well and carefully, and his shoes were closed on the top and impervious to the dirt and dust of the road.

"What do you want?" Al spoke in Latin, his first language, before he realized this boy wouldn't understand him. He switched to a dialect of Italian that was specific to Venice and repeated the question.

"You're a very pathetic creature." said the boy in Latin. This was surprising, but not unduly so. Albireo looked for another stick to whittle.

"How old are you?"

"I don't know." It was a common enough answer.

"Humph." said the boy condescendingly. "I can tell. Would you like some dinner?"

Albireo looked up in surprise. Kindness, however misdirected, was a very rare commodity. "Why?"

"Because you've lived a long time and you're on the brink of something you cannot return from."

Al shrugged noncommittally. "I like food."

The boy, showing deceptive strength, pulled him up. Al staggered a little. He hadn't moved in hours, maybe days. He couldn't really tell anymore.

The boy's home was a small house on the edge of some woods, not even close to town. It was built of wood and expertly crafted, but Al didn't see any adults in sight. He didn't really care. He'd learned long ago that you should never judge a book by its cover.

Apparently the boy hadn't just meant dinner, because when they entered the cabin the boy pointed at a large tub and said harshly, "Wash."

"What?"

"Are you hard of hearing? You're filthy. Go and wash."

Al dipped his fingers in the tub and was surprised to feel scalding hot water. He had known many humans who had bathed, back when he'd first been born, like Cleopatra and the majority of Egyptians. Of course, things that were good for you never seemed to last, and humanity had quickly returned to the practice of not being clean. He vaguely heard the boy sigh.

"Are you going to take your clothes off or do I have to?"

Al strangely felt embarrassed as he disposed of his clothing. Normally he wouldn't have felt the slightest bit of shame, but this boy's piercing gaze made him uncomfortable. The rest of his body was just as dirty as his face, and he climbed into the tub awkwardly, his tired and sore muscles protesting.

He scratched at the dirt caked on him halfheartedly, and the boy shoved his head down a little. "Honestly," he huffed. "Some people can be so helpless. Use this." He dropped a bar of lye soap into the tub, and some feral part of Al embraced the idea of being clean, and Al scrubbed at himself with a fury he didn't know he still had left in him.

The boy turned to the fire, which had a large kettle over it. Al could smell the food from there, and his stomach roared to life. He returned to unsuccessfully washing the grime off himself.

The boy sighed again. "You're pathetic." He grabbed the soap and brutally scrubbed Al's back and neck until his skin was raw, and forced Al to do the same. He attempted it with his hair, but it was as stiff and unyielding as before. Now that he was clean, he could feel the digustingness of his hair.

The boy returned with scissors, the first pair of decent scissors he'd seen since Egypt. "It'd be best if you'd cut your hair, but I suppose if you're really attached..."

"Hair grows back." said Al hoarsely.

"Finally a sensible sentence out of you." grumbled the boy, taking the scissors to Al's head and cutting his hair practically to the scalp. He swept the hair out of the house to the back. Al couldn't blame him, it had been gross and probably was crawling with insects.

"Now finish up and I'll get dinner. There are clothes on the chair."

Al didn't mind being ordered around. It had been years, decades, since anyone had even noticed him. He'd spent the last few centuries wandering around the wilderness, keeping away from people, hoping that when he re-emerged the world would be drastically different. It hadn't changed at all, plunging Al into an even deeper depression.

He pulled on the clothes, surprised but pleased to see that they were clean and warm, and the fabric wasn't rough.

"Dinner." said the boy. His voice always seemed to be glum for some reason, always in a state of perpetual gloom.

Al quietly say at a wooden table, filling an earthen bowl full of stew. It was the best stew he'd ever had, full of flavor. He could tell it was fresh meat, unspoiled by days left out. Humans didn't know how to cook like this.

"I've had a long time to learn how to cook," said the boy. "I'm much older than you probably think."

"What...What's going on?"

"My name is Zecht. Call me Filius. How about you?"

Al drank his stew greedily. "My name's Al."

"Just Al? When a man has lived long enough he gets many names."

"Al..bireo," said Al, saying the syllables of his name for the first time in years. "Albireo Imma."

"Latin, as I thought. Where were you born?"

"Do you...actually care?" Humans always had their own interests at heart, and they didn't care to hear another man's story.

"Every man needs to tell their life to."

"Yes, but do you care?"

Filius examined him with his grave, serious eyes. "A little. Enough for you to tell me."

"I was born in Gallia...France, I think they've started calling it?"

"Refer to it however you want," shrugged Filius. "Names come and go."

"We were some of the first to be conquered by the Romans, so I was raised speaking a combination of Latin and Celtic."

"About seven hundred years ago, correct?"

Al stared at a lump of venison in his stew. "I guess it was that long ago."

"Years pass by fast. Would you like to hear about me? I'm warning you, this may be the only time you ever here my speak about my past."

"Okay."

"I'm about three hundred years older than you. I'm a demon from the North, and I helped create Mundus Magica about two hundred years ago."

"Mundus Magica?"

Filius showed a flicker of surprise in his otherwise emotionless face. "You've been alive this long and haven't stumbled across the Magic World?"

"Are there a lot of magic users out there?"

Filius chuckled. "You really don't know much, do you. I suppose you've just been wandering Earth looking for death so far, right?"

"...Yeah."

"That's how most of are in the beginning. That is, if we have any sense of decency in us. Repelling a power that the rest of the world longs for is a human's destiny."

"I thought you were a demon?"

Filius shrugged, ladling himself some more soup. "Not always. I was human too. I still think I am. Humanity is a concept that is not confined to two-legged men. I think all sentient beings possess humanity. To meet a sentient being without humanity is a terrifying and unimaginable thing."

"That makes sense."

"You're smarter than you're letting on. Don't be shy, I've spent much too long around idiots in my life."

"When I was in the Library..." mumbled Al. "I read about a lot of things. It leads me to think that you're right."

"Hmm..." pondered Filius. "If this is the same Library I'm thinking of...how did you get from Gallia to Egypt?"

"I was a stupid child." confessed Al, the barest hint of a smile. If Filius Zecht smiled in response, it would've been even harder to see.

Al finished his stew, looking at his hands. "My hands...they hurt."

"You've noticed?" snorted Filius. "I thought you would've died from blood loss if you could've. What did you do, try to skin a porcupine?"

"I was whittling."

"You suck at it." replied Filius honestly.

"Yeah..."

Filius retrieved a roll of bandages from a hole in the wall (an invention that would later be known as the modern closet) and bandaged Al's hands none too gently.

"Ow," complained Al. "You're not very good at this."

Filius didn't seem to care. "I've always thought that a little pain wakes you up. What do you think?"

Al met the young boy's eyes. "I think you're right."

"Hey...isn't Filius Zecht one of Negi's dad's friends? He was in Rakan-san's flashback movie..." wondered Asuna.

"Yes, he is." said Al pleasantly.

Konoka clapped. "Wow! did that really happen? Are you really that old?"

Chisame awarded Al a grudging smile. "That one was pretty decent."

Asuna yawned. "Man, I'm tired...ah, I didn't fall asleep or anything, I just didn't really get enough sleep last night..."

"That's perfectly all right," chuckled Al. "I practically fell asleep myself."

"How? It was good!" protested Chisame, to her own chagrin.

"Yes, well, I've lived it, you see. That automatically makes it less interesting. Besides, I thought people didn't like hearing old stories...I should probably stop telling these to you."

"No!" protested the three girls in unison.

"I love your stories!" chimed in Konoka. "Even the samurai one!"

"That one was weird..." grumbled Chisame, unwilling to admit that she'd role-played a geisha to another user's samurai online.

"I suppose I could tell you more..."

The girls cheered, and Al raised his teacup in acknowledgment. Being junior high school girls, they had soemwhere to be, and Al drank the dredges of his tea in peace, wondering why on earth he was still telling them his stories. In a hundred years he would once again be the only one who remembered him.

What did you think? Filius Zecht is one of my favorite characters. Reviews are love!