Disclaimer: I do NOT own Beelzebub!

I knew I'd meet death before I'd let you meet harm.
Although questions arose in my mind, would I be man enough?
Against wrong, choose right and be standin' up?

That night, I don't think one wink I slept
As I slipped out my bed, to your crib I crept
Touched your head gently, felt my heart melt
Cause I know I loved you more than life itself

"Just the Two of Us" – by Bill Withers

Chapter 4: The delinquent Father

Hilda was on her way to the roof. That fool Oga didn't come back yet so she had to ask Saotome for more time to complete her duty and clean the floors. The odd teacher was content with the fruits of her labor and told her to take time and deal with it before going home.

However, she had to meet a certain someone first, who was waiting for her up on the roof. When she opened the door, Kunieda was already waiting for her. Her long blue hair waved in the cold breeze, as she seemed to be engrossed in thought. Kunieda became aware of Hilda's presence immediately and turned over to face her.

Kunieda looked left and right to play safe and make sure that they were alone. Then, she turned her gaze to Hilda again and smiled a little. "I knew that you'd come, Hilda-san."

Hilda kept a solemn face and didn't let Kunieda get a word in edgeways. "I'm not going to stay for long. I've only come to say one thing." Kunieda was surprised for a moment as Hilda continued. "I'll keep the baby stuff for myself and won't talk about it anymore. However, I expect nothing in return."

Kunieda blinked in confusion. Although she reached her goal that the existence of Beelze would stay a secret, she didn't seem to be satisfied. Maybe, she had doubts about whether to trust Hilda or not yet.

The latter turned around and wanted to leave, adding one last thing. "It's not that I'm interested in Oga Tatsumi as well as his child."

There was a moment of silence and Hilda guessed that the conversation was finished. She made a few steps towards the door before Kunieda spoke.

"It's not his child!"

"Hm?" Hilda thought that she didn't hear right and stopped. She looked back at Kunieda behind her again.

Kunieda's dark bangs covered her eyes and she seemed to hesitate whether to continue or not. She lifted her head again and directly looked into Hilda's eyes.

"Beelze isn't Oga's child. He just picked him up somewhere and takes care of him now. That's all I know."

This time, Hilda couldn't hide her puzzlement. She opened her eyes widely and wondered. "He picked him up? But… he's just a high school student like us. In spite of that,… he adopted a child? But he…"

"Yes, he's still under age and actually, it's not legal to take custody of a child when you're only 16. That's why Beelze's existence must be a secret." Kunieda explained. "Probably, Oga went home to look after him earlier… I think that he's still at home right now. Normally, Beelze would sleep the most of the time until Oga gets back from school. Anyway, he goes home to see Beelze during lunch break."

Hilda just stood there and was at a loss for words. What Kunieda just told her a moment ago was so… unrealistic. It was hard for Hilda to believe the whole story of a young, 16 years-old man, adopting a baby. And to think that that young man was the same impolite jerk who jostled her the other day: Oga Tatsumi, attending a school for delinquents.

On the other hand, Kunieda had no reason to lie to her, right? So, what she told her was most likely the truth. Hilda couldn't think of another explanation. She was so confused that she didn't know what to do. She returned to her usual stoic expression and left for the door. Before she went in again, she asked Kunieda one last question without looking at her.

"Kunieda, why have you told me about all of this?"

Kunieda didn't answer straightaway. A shy smile formed on her lips that Hilda couldn't see. "I don't want people to get a wrong impression of Oga… that's all."

Without saying another word, Hilda left.

An hour had passed since her conversation with Kunieda. Hilda was sitting on a bench on the schoolyard, tired of scrubbing the entire dirty floors of the school building. However, her weariness came not only from the hard work but also from what she heard a while ago.

A delinquent father.

That's what she thought.

It was still hard to believe that a guy like Oga Tatsumi would parent a baby voluntarily. Allowedly, she didn't know a single thing about him. Only that his strength was admired and respected by his classmates, as much she caught from their reaction in class before. She didn't get what Kunieda meant by 'he lost', but everyone seemed to be shocked by that matter of fact.

"Check it out man!"

A group of four guys approached her, their ill intentions already written on their faces. Hilda didn't even bother looking at their nasty figures.

"Hello Miss, are you lost or something?"

Deeply absorbed in thought, Hilda was barely aware of their presence.

"Hey, she's totally ignoring you! That's so uncool, dude!"

It became so loud that she couldn't concentrate anymore. To avoid any kind of trouble, she silently stood up and headed for the school building. Her act earned one of the guys teasing laughter from the other three, which galled the first one. He stopped her at the entrance of the building, pulling roughly at her wrist.

"Just you wait, bitch! There I am trying to be a gentleman once and the only thing you do is…"

The guy stopped mid-sentence when Hilda turned over, glowering at him. Her green eyes bored into his menacingly with the mere intent to kill. "Hands off, you scum!"

The other three guys gulped heavily while the leader's hand twitched for a moment. After a moment of hesitation, he lifted his free hand to strike a blow. Hilda didn't even blink and continued scowling at her opponent.

"L-Let it be, man! That chick is dangerous!" one of the others suggested. "Come on, let's… UAAAH!"

"Shut up! You're too noisy!" The man in front shouted without looking behind. "This whore wants to learn it the hard waaaaaa-ungh!"

Hilda, who was quite unimpressed by the molesters, kept a straight face until now. Nevertheless, the impact of the blow, the crack on the wall and the newcomer were enough to astonish her.

"The delinquent father." came to her mind.

Oga slapped the guy in front with his left against the wall and left a well-defined print of his face behind. The others were already trembling in fear, almost wetting their pants.

"You're in my way." Oga commented dryly after letting the guy slide on the ground.

Hilda, who was standing there dumbfounded, watched Oga Tatsumi. She wasn't able to give account of her increasing heartbeat all of a sudden. Although he was beating the shit out of the other guy right now, she saw Oga in a new light. She felt like one part of her wanted to believe Kunieda's story unconditionally with her whole heart.

Oga turned around and looked at the rest of the group angrily. "Now, look at what you've done! Who do you think will clean that up, hm?"

"It's your fault!" the group wanted to complain but they didn't dare to oppose to Oga. "O-of course, we have n-nothing to do right now. W-we'll clean it instantly."

"Not that I have already enough to do…" Oga murmured as he passed by and entered.

"You can go home."

"Hm?" Oga stopped and turned around. He assumed that Hilda's words were targeted at him and threw her a questioning look.

"I've already done the cleaning. And Saotome-sensei cancelled afternoon classes." Hilda explained. She made sure that they were quite a distance away from the cleaning fellows at the entrance and continued. "So you can go home or better to a doctor first."

"Doctor?" Oga wondered. He rarely went and saw the man dressed in white. When he thought back, the last time was with his parents and sister for a flu shot years ago, while he was still living together with his family.

As he was lost in thought, Hilda closed the short distance between them and took his right arm. Although his sleeves were rolled up and there was nothing peculiar to be seen on his arm, Hilda arched a brow and peered skeptically.

Oga, who didn't get her point in doing that, protested. "Oi, what are you doing, you… hngh!"

He twitched for a split second when Hilda pressed lightly on his arm. "Just as I thought…" she dryly commented. Without saying another word, she let go of his arm and went off.

Oga was quite simply stunned. He succeeded in hiding his injury even from that bastard Saotome before. Sure, it wasn't a severe injury. He probably sprained his arm at the most last night. Nevertheless, how did she notice that? That was what he was going to find out right now.

"Oi, wait! How did you know that?" he reached out for her.

Hilda stood still for a moment and enlightened him. "You were holding Beelze on your right arm yesterday. And you struggled with scrubbing by only using your left hand earlier. Obviously, you are a right hander." She interpreted his hush as a confirmation. As he stood there stock-still, she went back to the classroom and disappeared.

Once again, the motionless Oga could only watch her retiring figure. "Damn, is she a fed or something?" he wondered astounded. The more he got involved with that woman, all the more she became a greater mystery in his eyes.

"WHAT? You've gotta be kidding!"

"Ow, don't shout in the receiver each time." Furuichi complained. "Saotome-sensei was quite angry that you didn't come to afternoon classes first. However,…"

"Wait, I must feed Baby Beel now. I'll call you back!" Oga hung up and filled the warm milk in Beelze's bottle. Then, he took the empty milk bottle and wanted to bring it outside. "That damn bitch!" he cursed angrily on his way to the door. Why the hell did she lie to him about the afternoon classes? Was it still about her soaked documents from yesterday? Or did she take vengeance for Saotome's punishment that morning? But Oga was still in complete agreement that it wasn't his fault at all. Besides, he didn't tell that stubborn woman to wipe all the floors of the whole school by herself, right?

He vented his wrath on the door by slamming it open and chucked the piece of glass hard in the bin next to the doorway. He just wanted to go in again when he sensed something rustling under his foot. Making a step back, he looked down and found a large envelope. Looking to the right and left then, he couldn't see a single person on the deserted floors and staircase.

First, Oga hesitated for a moment but then, he decided to pick the envelope up and went in. As he opened it, he was surprised to find a pack of notes. They were all written in a neat handwriting and some parts were colorfully underlined to emphasize important rules and summaries. It didn't take him long to realize that they were the notes from today's afternoon classes. And he recognized the script, too.

It was the same handwriting as on her milk-soaked papers from yesterday.

After Oga rocked Beelze to sleep in the late afternoon, he went for a run like every evening. Due to Hilda's previous lie, he had more than enough time to finish the baby stuff earlier and even returned home before the latter woke up. Otherwise, he would call Furuichi and ask him to keep an eye on Beelze for a while until he got back. Although his friend was probably busy now reading one of his favorite magazines or doing whatever nonsense, Oga would always find a way to convince him, be it the hard way or the even harder way…

On his way back home, he usually bought his dinner and another bottle of fresh Alpine milk for Beelze. This time, he even bought a double portion of his favorite food, croquets, since he felt hunger pangs. It would always happen if he became extremely furious and there was not a single fool around to take it out on.

The reason for his bad temper?

HILDA!

Oga entered the tower building and scared the few passersby by scowling at them. He immediately started with his last training session by running to the staircase fast as the wind in order to let off steam. "When I get my hands on her…!" he muttered under his breath as he increased his speed.

Approaching to the familiar spot from yesterday, he slowed down unconsciously. He was just about to turn the corner when he noticed someone kneeling on the floor. It was impossible for him to stop or shun the person at his momentary rate, so he raised his speed to the maximum and jumped up. He easily gained enough height to avoid the person on the floor, who defensively held her head and bent down.

Oga was able to land on the ground without breaking a single bone. "Phew, that was a close thing!" he sighed, wiping away some drops of sweat off his face. He put the plastic bags in his hand aside and turned over to examine if the other person was all right. Only now, he realized who the kneeling person really was.

"You…!"

It was none other than 'the source of his bad temper', who lifted her head by hearing his familiar voice and revealed her green eyes. "Who else could it have been…!" Hilda hissed gloomily, as if she already expected to meet Oga.

"Why are you muckraking on all fours here?" he asked, offering her his free hand halfheartedly. Actually, he would think that he frightened the person on the floor out of their senses first.

But not Hilda!

Oga still didn't know what was so… different about her. At any rate, she was different from other women he knew. Even if she was calm and silent in the majority of cases, he believed her to be capable of quite a lot. She even had the guts to take the fucking jerks on alone earlier, right?

However, he didn't fathom out what made her so different yet. Damn, he couldn't even find a bloody word to describe her.

She was just… different.

Hilda ignored the offered hand and stood up on her own. "Imagine, I don't even have time to mess around with you! I'm searching for something very important to me, so don't bother me…" she stated while looking around.

Oga was standing stiffly and motionless on the spot as he glared stunned at his outstretched hand. There he was, trying to be nice for once in his damn whole life! And all he got was… being ignored?

In a flaming temper, he clenched his fist and tried to control himself. "Well! For all I care!" he spoke through gritted teeth. "Don't mind me! Go ahead and crawl on the floor which you recently described as the dirtiest place in world!"

He turned over, took his bags and walked to the stairs. "Dirtiest place in world?" he wondered. "She didn't even say such a thing." It wasn't difficult for him to notice that he overreacted and exaggerated a little bit. No wonder, he still couldn't get yesterday's events out of his head, that's why he remembered her words exactly.

Yesterday's events…

Oga stopped.

He blinked twice until the penny had dropped.

Glancing aback, he saw that Hilda was continuing her searching. Oga went back and stopped at the same spot behind her again.

Hilda seemed to have sensed his presence as she lifted her head and threw him a questioning look. "What now?" she asked irritated, arching a brow.

Oga made a step back, turned over and went ahead, gesturing with his free hand.

"Come with me."

Oga opened the door to his apartment, which wasn't closed this time, too. He held the door open and waited for Hilda to come in.

"No, thanks." she refused. "I'm in a hurry so let's quickly get over with this."

He nodded and went to the drawer and brought what she was waiting for. As Hilda saw the dark familiar item in his hand, she breathed a sigh of relief.

"Thank goodness! I've been afraid that I lost it in the taxi." she said and checked the small case's content briefly.

"You should rather thank me that nobody else found it." he replied promptly. "Someone else would have already sold it."

"Excuse me? It's thanks to you that I actually dropped it in the first instance, so don't expect any gratitude from me!"

Somehow, he thought that she had a point there.

But Oga would never admit that!

"Well, whatever! In any case, check back thoroughly if something's missing there." He pointed at the black case. "I don't want you to accuse me of thievery later."

Nevertheless, Hilda disobeyed him and put the item in her bag. "No need. It's not that you've accused me of thievery, too, when I entered your house illicitly, have you?"

She had another point there.

Yesterday, Oga didn't even bother looking around to see whether something was missing in his house. Why would he? There wasn't something of value to be stolen around after all. Besides, she was indeed right and entered his apartment illicitly. But she did it for the best and was drawn by Baby Beel's cry.

Anyway, this was no explanation for why she trusted him now.

Oga was still giving thought to it whereas Hilda was just about to leave. Then, she paused all of a sudden and asked without looking at him.

"How… is Beelze?"

"He must be sleeping." he assumed. "But he might wake up any moment though…"

"I see."

There was a moment of silence and neither of them moved away. Oga inwardly smiled at her concern about Beel. An image of her sleeping with the baby in her arms on the couch occurred to his mind. He was fascinated how much she cared for a strange infant that she barely knew for less than 24 hours.

On the other hand, wasn't he the same?

Then, a flash of insight hit him. "Wait a minute! Don't tell me…" He turned his head and looked at the pile of notes on the table inside. Then, he looked back at Hilda and finished his thought. "She lied to me about afternoon classes so that I could go home earlier and take care of Beel?"

That basically made no sense for him now but there again, it was the only plausible reason.

"Well,… see you."

Hilda's words made him come back to reality and he saw that she was about to leave. Oga needed to act quickly now before it was too late to stop her.

"Wait!"

Indeed, he was able to stop her. She turned around and looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to go on.

"Shoot!" he thought. He didn't even know why he had stopped her or what he was going to say now. "Think! Think, think, think, dammit!"

At this moment, his stomach growled loudly and Oga remembered that he didn't eat anything since breakfast. "No wonder that my brain isn't working…" But then, he came up with a brilliant idea.

"Do you like croquettes?"

"Hm?" Hilda didn't quite understand where that question came from out of the blue. "S-sure…"

"I knew it, nobody can resist croquettes!" He exclaimed triumphantly. "I've plenty of them! Do you wanna have dinner with us?"

Hilda blinked in confusion and wondered how that conversation turned out like this. Although she hesitated a little bit, a part of her wanted to accept the invitation.

"Furthermore,…" Oga added finally. "Beelze would also be happy to see you again."

The mere mention of Beelze made her face soften a little bit. After a while, she accepted at last and entered the apartment.

She was quite impressed how tidy and clean it was inside, compared to the last time she came there. No dirty clothes in sight and no dirty dishes in the kitchen either.

"It seems that a fairy has visited your place since yesterday and worked wonders." she commented dryly.

"Only Beelze believes in fairies." he answered. "Guess what, I also clean up like any normal human once in a month …"

"Only once in a month means 'normal' to you?" she asked, wringing her nose.

"Sure. Besides,…" he advanced to the living room. "…compared to Furuichi and Toujo's place, it's a large holiday paradise here."

Hilda ignored his last phrase since she neither knew that Furuichi nor Toujo. But she remembered Oga calling the silver-haired fool in their class that name.

As she entered the living room, a pair of big turquois eyes met hers. Beelze blinked curiously at the newcomers and cheered as soon as he recognized Hilda. She could hardly hold off and wanted to run to the sofa and embrace the cute little baby. But before doing that, she glanced at Beelze's 'father' as if asking for permission.

"Go ahead." Oga almost smiled. "Seems like he was already expecting you."

Hilda didn't wait any longer as she nodded and gratefully smiled at him. "Thank you!"

When she sat down on the sofa and took Beelze in her arms, Oga froze. He just thought how natural and… pretty her smile was that it almost took his breath away. He didn't know why but he felt as if he could watch the happy couple on the sofa for hours or even longer.

"He likes you."

"Hm?" Hilda turned her gaze to Oga while Beelze was pulling lightly her bangs. "How can you tell?"

"The first time I've met him, about six months ago, he had a similar expression. Although it was raining buckets and he was abandoned at dead of night, it was a miracle that he was still able to laugh happily like now." Oga looked at the setting sun out of the window while he recollected his memories of that day. "I was coincidentally passing by a desolated quarter when the loud bark of a dog grabbed my attention. Running towards the direction where it came from, I found Beelze enwrapped with a small blanket in a basket. The dog was almost ten times bigger than Beelze himself. Yet, he didn't cry, nor did he make a single sound. I have no idea what would become of him if I didn't arrive."

"Why…" Hilda asked cautiously, petting Beelze's head. "Why did you take care of him yourself instead of bringing him to the police or to an orphanage?"

Oga's thoughtful expression softened a little bit. "Can't you tell yourself? Each time I had the same thought, he looked at me with those bright, innocent eyes and changed my mind. I guess that even a thug like me can't resist that little guy."

He turned his head to the couple in front of him and sought Beel's heart melting smile, which always gave him a feeling of contentment. But what he saw instead, surprised him to such an extent that he almost jumped up and paniced. "Whoa, wait there now! Why are you crying?"

Hilda rubbed her eyes with her free hand and smiled at Beelze while talking to Oga. "I'm not crying, fool. Beelze is just pulling hard my hair…!" she lied. "Anyway,… why are you telling me all of this?"

He didn't answer to her instantly since he didn't know the reason himself. Scratching his head, he looked away from them. "No particular reason. It's just been a while that I've seen him beaming with joy like that. He seems even happier than back then, when I first met him."

Just when she opened her mouth to add something, the doorbell rang. Oga looked at his watch and saw that it was about eight o'clock. So, it couldn't have been Furuichi, who was probably watching his favorite show on TV right now. But there weren't many people who knew his house either.

Hilda sensed the change in his aura as Oga became suddenly so wary. He gestured her to stay silent until he got back. She silently nodded and pulled Beelze close to her body. Watching Oga's retiring figure, she suddenly remembered Kunieda's words.

Beelze's existence must be a secret.

Oga stopped directly in front of the door and eavesdropped. He couldn't hear anybody talking so he assumed that it should only be one person. And he was right.

When he opened the door, he was astonished for a moment. There was a bearded man in front of his door, almost two heads taller than and twice as wide as him. He was wearing a black suit and sunglasses, which reminded Oga of a bodyguard. His tan made him look like a foreigner, as his weird accent did:

"Excuse me for the late disturbance, Sir, but I'm looking for a woman."

First of all, I want to thank Massu Chan and Wowserz in muh pantz for supporting me concerning my exams. And I hope that I deserved a muffin from zeroblade63... xD

I want to repeat once again that this story will only base on Oga & Hilda's relationship. That's the only reason why I left out the demons, so that I'd be able to concentrate more on their relationship. Otherwise, I don't plan on changing too much of the original story. I don't know how much you expected of Oga and Beelze's story, but I hope that you're not overmuch disappointed…

What I want to ask you readers now is to give me a feedback about the humor: do you want more/less funny parts or shall I keep my current balance? That question occurred to my mind because I recently saw a discussion thread about Beelzebub, questioning: "A Beelzebub without Furuichi…". In my opinion, Furuichi is essential for the manga as much as the Demon Lord himself! :D But back to our topic, I'd really like to know your opinions about humor in this story.

Thank you for reading this this story. See you next time…! ;)

~Illusion137