Marionette

Skies, Chapter Fifty Two - Danpen [断片]

In less than ten seconds, three very important things had become painfully clear to Amaya.

The first was that Katsuragi Toji still maintained his Okinawan connections, the second being that he was here in the flesh. And the third was that he still did whatever he hell he wanted, with no regard to his own appearances, or consideration towards others at all.

The manner in which he'd suddenly grabbed her was more than enough to have that as concrete as the fact that the moon had been blown up. Even his very appearances had changed very little, other than instead of a scraggled mane of black hair, Toji was well-kept, looking almost as sophisticated as Asano Gakuho, if that was possible.

But then almost as soon as she'd been grabbed by the hair like that, an explosion of sound came to her addled notice.

A startled gasp from either of the petit duo, but more prominent than anything else was the sudden exclamation from others, familiar voices belonging to the odd few that had been walking a few meters behind her.

The grip did not change in the slightest in response to the noise that exploded into life, nor did the terrified look across her face.

It was the sudden collision of a fist to the man's face that yielded her the release from his grip.

Stumbling back, a hand steered her to the side slightly, and before she could even look up, she found herself hidden partially behind Karma.

His grip was uncomfortably tight around her arm, though she found herself unable to particularly care about that at that second.

'It's been quite a while since a mere child has shown me such blatant disrespect...' Toji remarked, a whimsical edge to his tone as he shifted his piercing stare onto the redhead. 'Interesting ...'

He didn't appear the least bit bothered about the fact that he'd just been struck, which in a twisted way didn't surprise Amaya at all.

It was almost like it didn't register in his mind.

'Oi oi, I think you need your eyes checked, senile bastard.' The remarkably distinct voice belonging to Terasaka shot out from just behind as a couple of forms stepped over to put themselves somewhat between Toji and Amaya. 'You're the one who decided to attack without warning.'

'Oh? Is that what it looked like?' The tall man questioned, almost as if he was intrigued by the idea. 'I merely wished to take a closer look at the peculiar child.'

Undoubtedly, the man didn't see anything wrong with his own actions, since he wasn't on the receiving end of any harm that way.

A shiver tore down her spine as she felt his cold gaze fall upon her from past Karma, and the grip around her arm had tightened a little more.

'Now boy; Would you kindly hand that girl over to me?' He requested, his gaze narrowing upon Karma's unyielding form.

However, instead of Karma's undoubtedly sharp reply, another voice spoke up in turn, drawing the situation in yet another more alarming tangent.

'Don't you think that's enough, Katsuragi-sensei?' A feminine voice rung with almost lifeless chime.

The words the new voice had said were enough to cause an involuntary flinch to shoot through her, and for Toji to lift his piercing gaze from Karma.

'Wait, that's--' Terasaka had begun, however he cut himself off with a sharp hiss of pain as Karma slammed an elbow into his ribs.

'Genivierre, you took your time.' Toji mused with a quipped edge, gazing at a form approaching from the restaurant hall.