Hana: We're back!
Neah: So we are...I see you're making my life difficult now.
Hana: It's fun to mess with all of you though. -grinning- Xavier and I don't own D. Gray-man!
Neah: Good riddance...who are we talking to?
Hana: Them. -points to the readers-
... ... ... ...
+ - Chapter 40 - +
There wasn't a lot that could still surprise Neah anymore. At least, that's what he thought. Imagine his surprise when he heard crying one day, while he was hunting for a new home. After the fiasco that left his flat in shambles, he figured it was high time to get a place he could move into that was perhaps a little safer. It was this particular day where he heard the hiccupping sobs. He looked around, trying to find the source of the cries, before finally finding the source in an alley.
A young child, perhaps no older than five or six was currently crying over himself muttering things between sobs. What as a child doing here all alone? He couldn't see his face — and Neah was certain it was a boy the closer he got — but a messy mop of orangey-brown hair was clearly seen. Didn't he once see a little tyke running around the Millennium Mansion once? He'd been too focused on plotting the Earls demise back then. Sighing to himself, he placed a hand on the trembling form's shoulders, "Hey, are you lost, little boy?"
The head of hair shook.
"This isn't the safest of neighborhoods, you know. Did you come from the orphanage?"
Another shake. This wasn't getting him anywhere.
"Hey now, let's dry up your tears, alright? I'm Neah, may I know your name?"
This time the form stiffened. "N-Neah...?"
"That's right, what might your name be?" It didn't seem right that his name should warrant a reaction like that from a child. "I won't hurt you, I'm only here to help."
"..." From the hidden depths of his scrawny arms, an eye peeked out, and it was in that moment where Neah realized exactly why the boy acted the way he did. "How can I believe you? A traitor?"
"L-Lero?"
Lero glared angrily up at Neah. "You remember me," he said, more of a statement if anything.
"I do..." Neah carefully said, "Were you...on the streets this whole time?"
"No thanks to you." The little boy hissed, shrugging his shoulder away from Neah's hand. "I go home from school that day...and I find police everywhere...I find people I knew dead. People I called my family slain..." He hiccupped, "And now I see the bastard that did it."
Sensing the danger for what it was, Neah backed away just as a knife struck out at him where his gut had been. "Lero, put down that knife..."
"What right do you have to tell me what to do?" The tears were still falling. "It's your fault! Your fault they're dead! You and that stupid Walker twat!"
"Don't talk about my nephew like that." Neah scowled. "Do you even know the hell they put him through?"
"What hell?! They gave him a place to stay! And you two...how do you repay them in the end? YOU KILL THEM ALL!" Enraged as he was, Lero went to strike at Neah again. A member of the NOAH...and never once did he know? They kept Lero in the dark of all this? All their misdeeds? What would they gain for never telling Lero anything? Even Road, according to Wisely who heard from Tyki, had been Innocent at Lero's age...but even she was eventually succumbed to the madness that became the NOAH clan.
It was a good thing for Lero then to have been separated from the clan before they'd had the chance to fully corrupt the boy.
"Now, please try to calm down, Lero..." Neah didn't want to hurt the child. Hell, he didn't want the kid to harm himself either. He needed to get that knife away from him...but how?
"Don't tell me what to do, you damn traitor!" Lero screeched, swinging the blade in a wide arc.
The steel only sliced at his coat, missing his skin entirely. He silently thanked god for Lero's inability to wield any weapon in that moment. "Lero, you need to calm down, and listen to me."
"Like hell I will! You killed them...you killed my family! They're all gone, because of you! YOU'RE TO BLAME!"
"It's their own fault," Neah calmly told the boy, avoiding another stab. "They were bound to be killed eventually."
"THEY DIDN'T DO ANYTHING, YOU SON OF A—"
"Bitch? Go ahead, call me whichever name you deem to fit. But the fact of the matter is, they did terrible things. Allen suffered. I have suffered, and I lost my brother because of them."
"SHUT UP!" This time, the Ex-NOAH had barely enough time to dodge, he hissed when the blade met the skin of his arm. A shallow cut, but it hurt no less. "SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP! THE HELL DO YOU KNOW?"
He'd have to knock out the raging boy. Neah decided. Lero wouldn't listen to reason, that much was obvious. "Alright...you must need a nap then..."
"I don't need a nap! I just want you to die!"
Sighing to himself, Neah side-stepped Lero's next attack, and used his opening to attack the pressure point he knew would make the younger pass out. Once he was, the Ex-NOAH quickly caught the limp form before he could fall to the asphalted backway. The knife continued its descent from limp fingers, clattering on the ground. Never had the former Fourteenth felt so relieved to disarm a potential enemy rather than killing them.
"Can't leave you here, obviously." He said to the unconscious child. "A shame...I wanted to find a new place to live too."
Where was he supposed to take the kid?
Groaning and mentally slapping himself, Neah decided that the best course of action would perhaps be to take Lero to the current place he was going to be moving out of.
It was the closest place, after all.
As long as the kid didn't wake up, Neah would be fine.
Actually... what was he supposed to do when Lero woke up?
...
Did Neah own restraints? Like handcuffs... or something...?
No, no he didn't. That didn't mean he couldn't get himself a makeshift restraint...for just in case, of course. He would also keep any weapons out of Lero's reach...
He didn't want the kid taking a stab at him while he was sleeping or something.
But...there was also that annoying realization he couldn't really keep a kid in a situation like that either.
Neah hated being an adult at that moment. "You're more trouble than you appear." He growled.
Everything related to that damn 'family' was trouble...
Life really wanted to screw with him, didn't it?
. . - * - . .
Lero awoke on a soft bed, and feeling groggy as he sat up. "Where am I?"
"Perhaps the safer place I can think of where you can't harm me." Probably.
"Neah."
"Are you calm now?" Lero couldn't tell where the voice was coming from, but he sure as hell knew it must've been relatively close.
"I'm a little tired... but I wouldn't say that I'm completely calm."
"I'll take it." Neah said. A door opened and the man in question entered the dimly lit room. "Will you listen to what I have to say?"
"About what? I'm alone in the world because of you."
He never was the best with kids...he wasn't even sure how he was supposed to deal with Allen when Mana brought him home that day...
Well, Allen was still here, so he had to have done alright...
Wait... Allen ended up with NOAH...
Neah groaned at his incompetence. Allen called himself 'Mr. Unlucky'? Well, Neah D. Campbell was truly King Unlucky. And that wasn't a title he was at all too proud of...and he's had a few in his time... "Perhaps…yes, I have been the cause of that, however...there are still people who are still here...Tyki and the twins for example..."
"Liar."
"Wisely is with them," Neah continued, deciding to ignore the boys' outburst. "The fact of the matter, there are NOAH who are still around...but are being slightly better...role models." Could Tyki and the twins be considered as such? He knew Wisely was...
Why was he thinking of this again? Whatever.
Right now, he had an angry child to deal with.
The hell does he deal with this? "I will avenge them."
"Of course you will." The man sighed. "Did you not hear what I just said though? Devit, Jasdero, Tyki, Wisely...all of them are very much alive and kicking.
"And I don't believe you," Lero said. "You are the person that killed my family."
Sighing for what felt like the umpteenth time, Neah pulled out his phone, and dialed a number. It rang three times before someone picked up.
"If you can switch places with me, Neah, I swear, I—"
Why was he so desperate? Neah wondered, "Mikk, shut up. I have someone who would like to speak with you."
"Someone actually wants to speak with me?" Came the rather surprised response.
"He won't believe me otherwise."
"Believes ...what now?"
"I've got someone over here who doesn't believe the four of you are alive, so I need you to speak with him and confirm the information as true," Neah explained, eyeing Lero.
"Who else could there possibly be...wait...Lero? You mean you of all people have found Lero?"
Neah scoffed, "What do you mean me of all people?! Just talk to the kid already!" He then shoved the phone to Lero, who nearly dropped the device as it was given to him.
Lero stared distrustfully at the phone, glancing up at Neah.
"Go on." Sighed the adult. "Say 'hello' or something."
"...hello?" Lero asked into the receiver.
"Lero?"
The orange-haired boy stiffened. "T-Tyki?"
There was a shuffling, and two distinct voices make themselves known in the background. "Is that Lero?"
"Lero~ Lero~ hee~ long time no see! Why are you with that guy?"
"Jasdevi...?"
"Devit's over there~!"
"Jasdero's right there!"
"Jasdevi at your service, little pumpkin!" Both twins stated, having gotten hold of the phone, from what Lero could make out.
"Don't call me a pumpkin, lero!" The younger covered his mouth, feeling himself blush at that outburst. "D-dammit..."
"Hee~ we got him to say it, Dev!"
"Should've totally recorded that!"
"Give me my phone back you annoying little—!"
"Temper, temper, Tyki-pet~" Cooed the twins.
"Don't call me by that name!" The Portuguese male snapped.
"Tyki-pet~ Tyki-pet~" Both twins sang, and the antics on the other end of the line made Lero smile.
"You guys are really...really there..."
There was a crackling sound as someone sighed. "There's no way we'd die that easily."
"Now way in hell~!" The twins agreed.
"Stop that." Tyki grumbled.
Lero laughed as he listened, tears welling up in his eyes. He didn't think he'd ever hear this again...
"I-I'm glad...I-I'm glad t-to hear y-ou all a-again..."
"Tyki! You made Lero cry!" Jasdero's voice sounded
"Hell yeah, he did!" Snickered Devit.
"Like hell it was my fault alone you numbskulls!"
Neah watched the interactions Lero was giving, and sighed to himself when he saw the boy smiling. "You're such a handful."
"Sh-shut up... traitor..." Lero sniffed, rubbing at the tears falling down his face.
Neah only rolled his eyes. "We'll see to meeting up with them, I suppose." Come to think of it...did anyone ever tell Kanda about the twins...? Well, that wasn't his problem, now was it?
He'd leave that honour to Link or Tyki.
. . - * - . .
Tyki hung up the phone after having spoken with Lero. The last he'd seen that kid was the day he'd gone to school...the day the mansion had been overtaken by the police...and NOAH had fallen.
Way over a whole year had passed since then...
Well, had time flew by or what? It was an interesting topic to say the least.
He'd spent most of that time in prison, and the rest... being an asset to society.
That made him scrunch up his nose.
Just in the hell was he even doing with his life? "Perhaps...I need to reevaluate some things..."
He would have continued that train of thought, had the barrels of two modified guns not suddenly appeared in his face.
"Oi. Don't ignore us!" Sneered Devit.
Jasdero, equally annoyed with the Portuguese man, attempted to mimic his twin's reaction, "We don't like that at all, hee!"
"Why are you both so annoying?"
"Tyki-pet is destroying Jasdero's pure innocent heart!"
"Gonna pay double for that, ass hole!"
"Will you two cease your childish antics this instant?" The teasing stopped, as Madarao entered the room, outright glaring at the trio. "There are people who don't get much sleep, and you wouldn't like it when any of us are deprived of their sleep."
Tyki finally relaxed, thankful that there was now someone else there to stop the twins. Or, at the very least, to make sure he didn't have to suffer alone.
Wait...why was he also glaring at him? Then again, wasn't this guy usually always annoyed with any one of them?
Why couldn't one of the others come in here? Like Tewaku... or Tokusa... The both of them were easier to be around.
Tyki cleared his throat, before standing, "I'll...just be out of your hair then..."
He really didn't need to deal with whatever was going to happen within the next fifteen minutes.
If that wasn't a good idea, then he didn't know what would be...and really, that was perhaps the best idea he had all day, he was certain. With thought in mind, Tyki Mikk made his strategic retreat.
"Tyki-pet's gone, hee hee~" Jasdero informed his twin, staring at the place where the Portuguese male had been standing.
"What're we standing around here for? LET'S GET HIM!" Agreeing wholehearitly with Devit's plan, both twins raced after wherever they believed Tyki to have run off to.
Madarao sighed, "Good riddance."
Tyki alone was alright, but if the twins were added into the mix...
Madarao just wished they'd stay somewhere that wasn't his house.
... ... ... ...
That goes without saying...we cant say we're not picking on only some people, y'know!
R&R ain't for Rest and Relaxation, even if it's obvious I need it. Leave a review and let us know how we're doing, and show this story some love by favoriting! Click on that follow option down below to stay up to date with new chapters as they come, and hey, go check out Xavier's stuff too if you hadn't already!
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