The Informants

(1) Past - Silver

Silver sighed tiredly as he walked back to Atlantide after a long mission. He was absolutely exhausted as it had been his fifth mission that week and it was only Wednesday! He really needed to take a break but at the same time, he doubted that being at the guildhall would provide a real break for himself so missions it was.

Glancing up at the sky, Silver cursed as he realized how late it was getting. At this pace, the sun would set before he would even be able to reach Atlantide. Shoot. That wasn't good. With how tired he was, he would be vulnerable to attack. Heck, he was already vulnerable because of the darkness itself!

He started looking around for any matter of shelter or even just cover he could take for the night. Looking out on the horizon, however, he only saw trees, trees, and yes, more trees. He cursed again before sighing and coming to the decision that he was going to be sleeping in a tree. Hooray...

He did, however, decide to walk for a little longer before settling into a tree for the night. There was still some daylight left and who knows, maybe if he kept walking, he could run into a cave or something. His back was already pleading for the landscape to provide him with some kind of shelter other than that of a tree. 

No such luck. 

Unfortunately. 

It was only when the sun was beginning to dip below the horizon that Silver finally sighed and decided to pick out a tree to sleep in for the night. Luckily the trees around him seemed to be strong enough to hold his weight (not that he weighed much) and they were nice and tall as well. 

Re-quipping his wand, he was just about to use the lightning-travel spell that Reaper had taught him when suddenly a fireball shot in front of him, burning so hot that he could feel the heat of the flames on his face. He went to re-quip to the water-sword technique Reaper had taught him but before he could even utter a word, he was knocked to the ground with his attacker staring down at him, making him gasp at who exactly it was. 

"V-Varian? What are you doing?" He asked as he tried to struggle out from under him. He didn't expect his own guildmate to attack him. Sure, a lot of his guildmates were jealous of him for being Reaper's apprentice but he didn't think that they would attack him because of that. Wait, a second why was he even out here? They weren't even in Atlantide. "Why are you out here?"

"Oh, I was just coming back from a mission when I spotted the guild's biggest disappointment." The fire mage said as he stood over Silver. In his hands, he was playing with another fireball as he continued. "And I thought this would be the perfect opportunity."

"Opportunity for what?" Silver asked even though he had a sinking suspicion that he knew exactly what Varian meant by opportunity. 

"Oh just to get rid of the useless disappointment of a mage that somehow got an apprenticeship with our guild leader," Varian said with a smirk as he let the fire twist and turn in his fingertips. 

"You do realize you'll be arrested for murder right?" On the outside, Silver just managed to keep his cool but on the inside, he was panicking like no one's business. Of all things, he never expected for his guildmates to actually want to kill him because of his apprenticeship. That was just messed up. 

Varian for his part just chuckled at the mention of being arrested as he said. "They can't exactly arrest me if there's no body to speak of, can they?"

At this, Silver started struggling even more. No. NO. NO! He didn't want to die like this. Burnt alive by his own guildmate's hand. As Varian brought the flames to his face, he felt tears start to go down his cheeks. He didn't want to die like this, but in his state of panic, he couldn't even summon his weapons properly. He was helpless. 

"Aww, don't cry, Silver, I'm just doing the guild a favor," Varian smirked as the flames started to lick at the mask Silver wore. 

Suddenly, Varian's hands were gone as was the weight on Silver's chest. Silver just managed to prop himself up to see Varian clutching his head as if mad. At first, he was only groaning in pain, but then those groans turned into laughs, the pain turned to insanity. He watched as his guildmate seemed to lose his mind. 

Then before he could blink, some sort of force crashed into Varian like a tidal wave. While Silver couldn't see what had hit him exactly, it was clear that there was quite a bit of damage. Heck, the insane laughter had stopped and Varian looked like he was passed out. Then another wave of magic crashed into Varian, leaving his body bloodied and, from the way that his chest wasn't moving, Silver could tell that he was dead. The re-quip mage could only stare in shock, both fear and relief flooding through his body. 

A hand was suddenly offered to him. He looked up to see a brunette staring down at him with a not quite smile on his face as he offered his hand to him. Hesitantly, Silver took it, taking it as a sign that the other didn't wish him harm. That was when he noticed the white-haired male standing slightly behind the brunette. Seemed he had more than one savior this night. 

As the brunette lifted him to his feet, both he and the other guy looked him over as if to ascertain his health before the brunette asked. "Are you alright?"

"Y-yes, I'm fine..." Silver just managed to stutter out. 

"Oh yay! While I was curious to see what a flambee bear would look like, it seemed a waste when it came at the cost of a pretty face." The white-haired one said very cheerfully, almost insanely, before turning to the brunette. "Brother! We should take care of the body. I think the skull would be lovely for my collection."

Before Silver could even think of a response for that, the brunette nodded and let go of his hand as he turned to the body and threw it over his shoulder. The white-haired guy giggled insanely as he hopped up and down in excitement before suddenly running off. 

The brunette dipped his head at Silver slightly before following his apparent brother. 

Silver for his part could only stare after the direction they went. 

What the heck was that?

AN: So new story with a rather interesting soon to be pairing! I hope you guys liked it!