nestingdevil | ➥ OPEN POST | image, lyrics, prompts, etc

"Anata wa honto no jaku koto ga dekimasu," Kaede snaps back at Greed, shocked at how he talks to the man who was just trying to be nice. You can be a real jerk. Not knowing how the languages match between the two worlds, things are rare a coincidence, she still grabs the tray and pops the cover off, eyeing the food beneath.

It isn't familiar but it smells okay, so she snags the fork and digs in. This has to be another Rift, right? Dad and Barnaby and Ivan and everyone else is somewhere nearby, right? Yes. Has to be. So she isn't panicking (yet) nearly as much as she might have if she knew the truth.

"He was just trying to be nice, you know." Okay the food is definitely different. She eyes it a little harder, but it's edible and even though she might be pickier elsewhere, she deals with it for now.

"Ah-?" Greed lifts his head from his drink. The language she speaks is familiar, but different. Something about it a bit more smooth, a bit more poised. Not as rugged or as sharp as Ling and his bodyguards had used, but indiscernible nonetheless. But he raises his hands above his head, gives her the playful gesture of a surrender. Whatever she said, it can't be good, and from the tone of it, sounds like he may have hit a nerve or two.

"Oi, oi, oi - " The Sin starts, his eyes rolling behind his shades. For a second or two, there's a put-off look on his face. As if he's slighted by her correction, by her statement. "-wasn't anything personal, y'know. I'm just not that good of a guy."

But he slides his feet away as he watches her. She's hungry: it's a good sign. That there's still some light at the end of the proverbial tunnel and as the train takes a turn, Greed clips his drink by the rim. "Not that bad, right? Used to be a favorite. Least, around the 'Nest."

The Sin takes another drag from his scotch, slipping his tongue over ice before there's a crunch, a split and shards tumble down his gullet. He sets the glass down afterward, shooting a heel up to cradle against the opposing knee.

"Feeling a little better?" Greed says, as he slouches forward and turns his head back to her. He knows she isn't - there's too many missing pieces of the equation for her to be remotely all right. But, it's a start.

At least her looks, her language, her name will give her a reason to pass as not knowing anything about this place fairly well. All they would have to do is come up with a cover for the rest of it. However, none of that is in Kaede's mind as she eats; she's more focused on how she can find her family and friends. They have to be here, she's sure of it. Every time the Rifts happen, they're terrifying things, just like this one had been.

Too bad it hadn't been a Rift at all.

"The Nest?" Kaede questions after swallowing a mouthful. "And... I guess so, but Dad and everyone else have to be worried. I hope we can find everyone at this station you're saying is coming up." Oh, how little they both know for the moment.

She wriggles a bit to get his vest off of her, offering it back for now. "...how long has it been since you were here, then?"

It wasn't a Rift; not even close to it. There had been no sinking feeling in his stomach, not buzzing in his skull. Just the choking sensation: the grip of an undertow and it had been like drowning over and over again. Swimming in a sea of black, hoping that the surface was just around the bend.

Until he woke up, body splayed, in the cart of a train.

Greed's frown tightens when she starts talking. She's human: she's different. The Sin doesn't understand family, not in the way she does. But that's not entirely right either, is it? "They're the only part of you that you chose!"

A thumb touches the glass and Greed picks himself up and out of his seat. He doesn't like this: this feeling clawing at his skull. Then she's asking something again and he tilts himself back on his heels. Spinning with the intricacy of a dancer until the point of his boot claps him still. He 'tsks' with his tongue and recoils into his shoulders.

"If what the say is true, it's been a while. It was 1912 the last time I was in Dublith and from there? Well - " There's a story, but it doesn't need to be told. Not now, not to her. It just isn't worth the trouble and Greed suddenly falls into a crouch. Knees splayed out and he jerks a thumb and forefinger back at her. "Doesn't matter though, right? We're here, at any rate."

Humans are frail. Fragile and easily breakable. A gunshot can stop them dead, but so can bad news. Emotional and unpredictable: Greed's not sure which direction she's going or where it'll take her. But lying's just not in the cards and he sits his elbows on his thighs.

He settles on a delay instead. "Like I said before: there's no such thing as no such thing. Might as well give it a shot, right?" As if to save him from the awkward situation, the train's comm crackles to life. Not with electronics or anything remotely advanced. But through the literal pipe-line and a voice echos inside carbon and copper: "Fifteen minutes until we enter Dublith Station. Please have all luggage readied for departure. I repeat: fifteen minutes until docking with Dublith. Please make sure to take all belongings with you. This train will making it's last stop and switching to a South-bound rail upon departure. Thank you."

Greed rocks his head to the side, fanning his hands over his knees. "Better finish up, kid."

But she has chosen her family, along with the one she was born with. Barnaby and Ivan aren't related to her at all, but they had become family to her. Another father, in a sense, and a brother. And in another sense, she had to chose her own father as well. When he had tried to reach out to her, after he had nearly ripped their relationship apart, she had to chose whether or not to let him back into her life.

Then Greed drops an absolute bombshell, making Kaede's eyes go wide, the fork falling from her hand to clank against the plate as she stares up at him. "...W-What? Did you just say 1912!?" Her voice goes up to a shriek for a moment in her utter shock. "No way! No way! It's almost 1980 back home!"

Never mind that the years are so vastly different between their two worlds that Greed might have said 'the stoneage' comparitively. 1912 Sternbild is still more advanced than 2014 for us.

The announcement over the train's PA system makes her groan, brushing hair behind her ears. She's in another world and has gone back in time and she has no idea where her family is. NOW the panic is starting to settle in.

"Oi, oi, oi - "

Greed's about to reach out and touch her, but he remembers just what sort of reaction that entails and he coils his fingers back to his palm. Her loud eruption has him standing, miming that of a meerkat out of its hole. Staring over his shoulder, watching to see if any caught wind of what she had to say. Thankfully, the door's secured shut and it's still just him, her, and the atom-bomb dropped.

The Sin presses a pinkie into his ear, his frown more like a dog that accidentally chewed up the corner of an expensive couch. He should have eased her in, but dodging the truth just wasn't in the cards. "It's 1918, if that helps any."

It doesn't.

The train starts to slow under them. Shifting to another set of tracks to send them straight into the mouth of town. His eyebrows knit and furrow - short cut and he sways his wrist to the air. "I guess it's fair to say it isn't like any other Rift then, is it."

He doesn't like this. Whatever the feeling is. Sinking and churning in his gut, going bad in the acid there. The homunculus grinds his teeth briefly before slipping to the side of the car. The latch at the exit door's easy enough to pick and he throws it open with a gentle click before motioning her forward. "C'mon. We'll get off before anyone even notices we were here."

Greed pries the door open with a shudder and the wind whips into the cabin. Tossing the leaflets of the pamphlet as if they were only dust on the ground. In the lash, he holds himself at the cusp of the railing and says one thing that's both surprising in his ears and sour in his mouth:

"I'm sorry, kid."

"What- What are you doing?!" Kaede shrieks, arm up to protect her face as now the door is open and he CAN'T BE suggesting what she thinks he is! Her eyes stare at him wide, grabbing her pack and moving towards him. "We're coming up to a station soon, why wouldn't we get off there!?"

He is insane! He can't seriously be- he's going to JUMP? Whoa- Wait-

"Did you say we?"

The spikes of his hair shake as the wind takes them. Sliding to and from the inky black and Greed puts his head to the whip-lash. There's smells here he's familiar with; the burning of coal on the outskirts of town, diesel in the engines just at the cusp. The flavors of shops closing down for the evening, leaving their overnight bakes to rise in packed ovens. These are all familiar and maybe slightly comforting, given the circumstances.

But he's not a creature to sit around and admire the beauty of things.

Instead, he slips over, wedging himself between the edge of the door and the bolt itself. Half-way inside the cart and teetering on the balance of falling straight out onto the rolling hillside below. Greed sneers then, dastardly with the flare of the 'Pit shining through each tooth.

She is quick. "We," Greed says, as he flips an index to the sky and circles it. "-figured that was kind of implied."

She's got her things, has her nap-sack, and Greed knows she'll have the 'Shield as soon as he grabs her. So he does - by the wrist, ensnaring his thumb and index-finger around her bones like that of a make-shift hand-cuff. He jerks a little more lightly though, as to not send her head-over-tiny-heels off the train cart, and gestures to the open spot on his back.

"Get on. Unless you'd rather stay here." The air makes his sunglasses quake and takes his voice out and away with a Doppler's effect. He can hear it in his ears, the way it's hard to make out just exactly what he's saying. But he hopes actions speak louder than words and as the iron-clad wheels below screech and pump, Greed dips a bit lower to give her some leverage at his shoulders.

"Oh, my god." Kaede breathes out, stumbling a bit with his jerk, as she realizes just what he wants to do and with her involved. This is the worst idea and this is going to get them killed! She knows he's not human, as he's stated several times, but to jump off of a moving train!?

With a heavy swallow, looking back into the empty car, she longs for the Hundred Power so she could make this hop not only easily but more safely. Why am I even thinking about doing this...?! Maybe because he has her wrist in a tight grip that suggests he isn't about to let go.

Before she can psych herself out anymore, she takes a jump and hops up onto Greed's back, wrapping her arms around his neck and shoulders, and hands on for dear life there. "If I get hurt I am going to find a way to hurt you, Shield or not!" she threatens into his ear, shouting over the wind.

"I don't plan on it."

The train chugs along, scraping against copper-steel track with a deafening holler of a whistle from the front. Greed peers at it once; a very brief notion as he shoves his head out to the whip-lashing wind. They're moving pretty fast, the ground under them just a blur in the near-pitch black of it. A few lights ignite it every so often; from the sparks on the line below, to the gas-lights dotting the rail-line.

Greed circles his arms around her legs, holds her still, and jumps.

At first, it's like silence. As he shoves a heel out and angles it down. The noise happens afterward; as rocks scream and jump under the dig of his boot. He skids for a good few seconds, carving out his own scar in the earth as his other ankle flicks out to make for the breaks. Sliding it to the side, as if he knows what this line of recklessness holds for him. The curved-tip of his boot springs up, slicing the wind as his thighs spread and tense.

Eventually, after dirt and gravel paves out to dust and grass, Greed finally slows down. The train they had been on is far ahead of them, groaning and chiming as it disappears around a bend. The Sin pops up laughing a bit to himself as he sees it pass around the curb.

"See - that wasn't so bad, was it?"

Kaede has literally no idea because she is holding onto Greed with every bit of strength in her tiny body, legs and arms wrapped around him in a death grip. Her eyes are tightly closed and buried in against his shoulder. And she's not letting go.

In fact, all he'll get is a little whimper of sound and if he looks down, he'll see that the Shield is up, and covering any available inch of skin.

She's terrified, and her power is activating for her regardless of how she feels about it.

"Oi, oi, oi - "

He starts in, shoving his thighs apart as he gingerly tries to pry her off. She's holding on for dear life and each inch of her is carbon-cold and smooth. Greed tests his own sharpened points and they flutter against the outer-shell. Ping, goes one. Clack, goes another.

One eye's shut lazily, the other only hanging up with the thread of a lid. He's good at the off-put expression and he isn't really concerned. But if they're going to get anywhere without a curious glance or two, she's going to have to at least try.

"Tch, jeez. You are more trouble than you're worth." But instead of forcing it, Greed hikes her up a bit further. He doubts he'll get a lot more out until they're on better footing. Or at least until they're as far away from the tracks as they can get. "You still with me?" The Sin says as he sags his body over to make up for the extra weight. It doesn't really bother him much and he's carried a bigger load before.

Ground shifts under his footing and he's pushing through the dark. Climbing up the side of a shallow hill. Dublith isn't that far and he supposes he owes her at least this favor.

"I hate you right now," Kaede whispers, very slowly lifting her head from his shoulder. The blue glow dies as she stops activating the Shield on instinct, letting out the breath she had been holding. "I can't believe we're alive. I can't believe we jumped off a moving train. Ohmygod."

She clings to him like a burr as he walks, looking around in the darkness. "Why did we get off the train anyway?!"

He taps her arm a couple of times, as if making his point very clear. "A little too risky, what with the show you just put on." His nail's still shivered to a point, but it recedes as soon as she drops her guard again and gains some composure.

Some, being the key word.

"That and I'm not sure how far the boys in the blue have gotten since last time."

That's all he says on the matter though. She doesn't seem to be letting go and that's fine. Greed makes easy over a few shaky rocks, prying himself up the hill with little effort. The town's just in sight and it's simple. Made of cobblestone, brick, and wood. Hardly anything that would be impressive, considering where she's from.

He does take a moment, though. To pause at the edge as his head rocks back. It's been a long time since he was last in Dublith. "Just do me a favor and try to hold back, hmn? At least until we get there."

"I'm sorry, okay?" Kaede lifts her head and eyes the town warily, but she has no idea where they are, where everyone else is, and she just had a huge scare. Her whole world feels off-kilter right now, leaving her to figure out how to get her feet back under her. "I'm not really good at controlling it when I get scared. It just kind of happens!"

Still, she does murmur a second, "I'm sorry," that sounds more heart felt than the original. "So will the military, that's the blue guys right?, try to hurt me?"

"What are you apologizing for?" Greed says as he speaks beyond the dip of his shoulder. He keeps his grip tight, fingers and arms nestled under legs that could easily be snapped in two if he were any other kind of monster. Thankfully, he wasn't and she's as safe as she can be for the moment.

"No, but I imagine a lot has changed since I was last around." The city opens up as they draw near; houses become clearer, the ground below them far more stable. Most of the windows have gone dark at this hour, though some still linger with a candle or two. Still dripping wax, waning with the early-onset of morning.

Greed pulls away from them though. Exchanging the rich orange-yellow for deep blues. For shadowy purples that chase the silvery-touch of moonlight. He takes a sharp left, veering a corner carved out of a rather shallow alleyway. It's a maze - of back ends of houses, of shops closed up and boarded shut. And the more they press in, the more gloom the surroundings become.

It's clear that the Sin's familiar to the territory, but it's not exactly a place a child like her should wander. At least, not alone.

But this time, little Red Riding Hood's got the wolf in her back pocket. She only needed to say the word.

Kaede goes silent as she looks around the completely unfamiliar town in the dark, almost holding her breath. In the late hour, everything is silent - more silent than a city girl like her is used to. There should be the hum of electricity and the honk of horns and a television's hiss drifting on the wind, but instead, there's nothing. It makes her hold on a little tighter, pressed in close to Greed's back as she tries to find anything familiar.

But there's nothing.

"...where are we going?" she whispers softly, as if afraid her voice will disturb the late-night silence. Greed clearly seems to have something in mind, but if he's right and he's been gone for all that time, where could he know to go?

"Where are we going?" It's a heavy question and one that Greed doesn't answer. Not at first, anyway. He hasn't been back to Dublith in quite some time. Not since the bullets ripped and the soldiers marched through the front doors with the bust of the century. It's here that it all started - that the world as he knew it turned topsy-turvy, shoving him head deep into a struggle that he had tried to stay out of for as long as he could.

It's here that he lost it all.

But he doesn't tell her that - she doesn't need to know. It isn't her place, isn't her history, and it sure as hell isn't going to help the current situation. Instead he just says: "My place."

There's more people when the alleyway opens up and the maw births a bit more life. Some doors still hanging open with drunken whispers. A few people perk up when he rounds the corner, but they don't move to ask. Maybe an eyebrow raised there, a glance here. But most of them look just as haggard as Kaede must feel - deep circles round the eyes, lips cracked and split where time hadn't been too kind. They watch with a glazed-over sort of look, as if the world could pass them by and they could care less.

Greed sags when they get to the mid-way point. When a few of the overhanging bulbs flicker, as if they hadn't seen some use. It's here, that the left-over dregs dwindle again and there's good reason. There's an opening to to left, a tunnel. Boards dot the rounded frame, giving a look of gnarled-wooden teeth in the dark. A monster of sorts, one the imagination could play tricks with ten-fold.

But above is something familiar. Something she should recognize fairly quickly. It's letters are a bit faded, the sign a bit more cracked than it had been five years ago. It groans and creeks, swaying just slightly with a small gust.

"The Devil's Nest."

Kaede squints in the darkness, frowning, as she lifts her chin from Greed's shoulder and studies where she's face. It takes her a moment, after all she had only been there once, before she realizes what she's looking at. It looks similar to the place Greed had taken over in Zelien. The Devil's Nest. What had given her the heebee jeebees the first time she read it.

Greed had been replicating his home in this world!

"...no one's lived here in all that time?" she whispers, looking around. This doesn't look like the kind of place that frequented a lot of traffic by any means, but right now, it seems better to be inside where it seems safer than out here, waiting for some sort of military to come capture her because she can't control her power.

Greed grabs one of the boards nailing the entrance shut. A few yanks gets it out, spitting nails to the ground as he does so. "Doesn't look like it. At least, not permanently."

Another board comes loose easily enough with the help of a claw or two. Greed scratches at the side, willing it out before he grips the upper-bend of the entrance. The stairs leading down below are covered in debris; old newspapers, a few cups here and there.

And of course, the bullet casings. Those hadn't been disturbed.

Greed shuffles inside, slipping down the small stairwell. There's more evidence to what really transpired here all those years ago. The claw-marks brisking and bouncing down the walls; like a language all on their own. He ignores them. Though unlike their small bout on the train, the Sin's face looks a tad more grim.

"Hurry up - before anyone notices, hmn? Not really interested in the company."

At the bottom, a ladder hangs loosely. It's screws have seen better days and the metal making up the entirety of it's littered in rust marks. Making patch-work on the surface and some of the outer-casing is frayed back. Like paper peeling away. Greed takes hold of a rung, hoisting himself up. A few shakes test its integrity and it's fine by his account.

"Uh, right." Kaede, however, even if the heavier Greed is on it currently, doesn't entirely trust that ladder. She makes a bit of a face before she spots the first set of claw marks, her brows shooting up at that. This place is totally creepy... she murmurs in her own mind, feeling highly dubious about the whole situation.

Still, with no where else to go, no one else to turn to, she makes even more of a face as she wraps her hand around the bar. Ew. She follows after him though, wishing she felt better about any of this that he was taking her into. What if someone's hidden inside or something!?

Up the rungs is a hatch and Greed makes easy shoving it aside. A cloud of dust follows when the wood crashes with the opposing floor above and the Sin climbs up. It's darker inside and the dim light from the street-corner makes monsters out of the shadows. Casting the entire place in an eerie blue more suited for someone's vacant sense of a nightmare.

Greed's heels knock hollow as he slithers inside and a few bullet casings roll away from his feet. Half the bar's torn up; splintered and brittle with cob-webs drawings lines across it. Above them, a lamp sways in a light breeze coming from a window. But other than that? It's quiet. Dead like a graveyard and Greed doesn't make a sound.

It's been a long time.

He stops just outside the hatch, reaching his hand inside to help her. Hopefully, they can skip the twenty questions for now. This isn't exactly where he wanted to bring her, but with little options, it seems the best choice.

When Kaede takes the hang and gets hauled up the last few rungs, she ends up just kind of standing and looking around the place with a mix of confusion, disgust, and fear. What happened here? It looks like this place had been broken apart from the inside and there is a terrible silence that fills it. Why are they here? Why not someplace with light and life?

"..." It's clear from her changing expression she wants to say something, but really, she doesn't know what. There's still a state of numbness that comes from too many shocks, one after another, in the last hour.

She wants to go home. She wants her dad and Barnaby and Ivan.

She's too quiet and it makes him a bit bitter. Not because of her, but because of what it all means. The loss of having, the act of stealing. It's in every jagged crack of wood, every broken window. Glass that dots the floor in sharp shards and each one tells a story. This place has seen its hardships and it seems like it wasn't at all intended.

Greed runs his fingers across the banister. It's familiar and broken. And like a toy found on the side of the road, it births a sense of nostalgia. A gut-twisting sort of expression that makes the insides tumble. Greed doesn't know it, doesn't really get it. But oh, does he feel it.

"It was a long time ago," he says flippantly. As he flings out his hand and offers her a shrug from the back. It doesn't matter anymore. Not when she's been dragged hallway to the pit and back with little more to spare. She's missing what makes her her. All safety blankets ripped right off and it's just the bitter cold to keep her company.

"Besides, the rumors would be enough to keep anyone out." The Sin turns over to look at her. "Oi, oi, oi.."

Kaede looks defeated. Damaged and broken with her choked-still silence. Greed swipes his hands back to his pockets as he walks towards her. Hunched over, bringing his shoulders raising. The red notches on his body stretch when his muscles tense. "It isn't all that bad, you know."

"I... I want my dad," Kaede whispers, curling her arms around herself. She's somewhere she doesn't know, people who would want to hurt her out there, still thinking this is something from COMPASS. She looks back and up at Greed, scared and uncertain. "What do we do? Now we're here, but what do we do?"

She looks around the broken room and fights hard not to let any tears fall. She's been through a lot in her life, but this is pushing her. "...I don't know what to do except find him and the others when we can."

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