-Vol 6: Dusk of An Era-

-Axel’s Request-

“Huh! I have slept?” Kenshin woke up in a start after a few hours of sleep. He then looked at his left and right before seeing the outside had been already turned dark through the window. He even saw a blanket was covering his body. Shaking his head to get rid of his sleepiness, he stood up and folded the blanket out of habit. Setting it neatly, he then went out of the door.

“Oof!!” only for something hard to directly impact on his privates. For a second, he felt like everything had gone dark, despite the light in the room illuminating everything. Then after getting clearheaded, which was actually took only a second, he saw the culprit. It was none other than Ellie, who was cradling her head and moaning in pain while Axel was beside her, caressing her forehead slowly.

“Ouchie! Did I run into a steel wall?” the little girl moaned while caressing her forehead. She had closed her eyes, as tears nearly streamed from them. She was in a purple top and red shorts, with pink socks on her foot, and her blue hair in twin tails, she looked absolutely adorable. As for Axel, he was too in a similar kind of clothes, only instead of socks, he was wearing a pair of thigh-highs with black puffy home shoes. Of course, in that garb, he looked even cuter and adorable than most girls.

“You two! When did you guys come back?” Kenshin was surprised to find them here. After all, before going to sleep, he had heard they wouldn’t be coming back in another day or two.

“Its already two hours. When we came back, I wanted to meet you, but since you are sleeping soundly, mom prevented us from waking you up.” Then she turned around, ran downstairs while shouting, “mom, big brother Kenshin is now awake!!”

“This rambunctious girl… she hadn’t changed at all.” Kenshin muttered before looking at Axel, who seemed to squirm while he stood there. He seemed like he wanted to say something but couldn’t dare to, and thus fidgetting there.

Narrowing his eyes, he asked, “what is it, Axel, you want to say something?” with his experience, he could tell that this lad wants to say something but was hesitating. So he kneeled down before him and softened his expression, and asked, “what do you want to say? Say it, don’t be afraid.”

“Brother, before we are called to the shelter, our school was supposed to be organizing a function. Everyone has to bring their guardians or parents… so, well, you are my parent as well as guardian… so can you come to my function?” even while speaking, he fidgeted a few times.

Hearing him, it was Kenshin’s time to widen his eye and fidget. Extreme guilt started to eat away his heart. It was true that he had brought him home, but never had he cared for him. In fact, he had never treated him as a brother even though this little guy was clearly treating him like his own brother. But seeing the expectant face of the kid, he immediately made his mind, “Of course I will go,” he said with a smile.

But he wasn’t finished, he grabbed into the tiny hands of the boy before saying, “I am sorry Axel, that I couldn’t give you time as your elder brother. I promise from today onward I will give you enough time.”

“Mmm,” the boy nodded before saying, “I know you have too many works to do. I also know that you want to grow stronger so as to keep both me and my big sisters safe, that’s why I don’t want to disturb you. Also, I am sorry for bringing you so many troubles.” His big watery eyes contained extraordinary brilliance that stabbed into Kenshin’s heart when he looked at him with them. More than anything, Kenshin was too much surprised at how sensible this little boy was. He wasn’t even a little bit sensible like this even when he was double of this boys’ age.

Kenshin then extended his hand towards his cheek before giving it a hard pinch, “you little brat! Who said you have brought me pain? You are just a brat, go and do what brats do the best, don’t think about this messy stuff, got it?”

“Yes!” the kid happily smiled before skipping downstairs and soon joined by Ellie who was standing just on the other side of the wall, listening to what they both were talking. She shouted and howled like a hyena and soon joined by Axel soon after. The otherwise silent home instantly filled with a happy atmosphere and laughter of kids.

“Hey, you are awake, finally. I just about sent Ellie to wake you up.” It was none other than Mrs. Yui who had donned an apron and was holding a wooden ladle. She was busy in the kitchen doing something whose smell was stimulating Kenshin’s appetite. She looked extremely happy while doing this. To her side, Ena was standing, helping her with her task. Though she was a zombie, due to Kenshin’s overwhelming stats, she didn’t look any worse than a healthy girl of her age, sans the emotionless eyes. She, too, donned an apron and was cutting something on the table, while standing on a small pedestal.

“Hey Miss Yui, when have you arrived?” he asked as he sat down on the sofa that had been miraculously cleaned up. Without a doubt, it was done either by Ena or Miss Yui.

“We are allowed to go just a few hours ago. There were too few people where Chiba’s mom and I were sent. By the way, what was that place? There are so many women and men with bad attitudes there, it felt suffocating.” There some serious hateful words were coming from ever mild-mannered Miss Yui, Kenshin wondered who was it that pissed off this good woman.

“That’s a privileged shelter allowed to a senior level hunter’s families who work for the government. Pretty secure place, even more, secure than the public shelter made below town hall towards the west of the Mito.” Answered Kenshin as he became comfortable on the sofa before narrowing his eyes, thinking, ‘there should be a Joy here, lounging like a monkey…’

“I don’t see Joy, where is he?” he asked.

“Joy has gone to bring some beer and sake… said it is for the celebration of Mito’s survival. Ah, by the way, he took your car’s keys.” The one to answer him was, of course, Ena.

Suddenly Kenshin sprang into sitting and made a horrified face, “what? He took my car! Ugh!!” he then moaned and groaned for a while before rubbing his palms on his face and asked offhandedly, “how the hell did he even find my keys? I thought I had hidden it well.”

“S, sorry Kenshin, it was me who found it and gave it to him. I don’t know you didn’t want him to take your car.” Miss Yui suddenly came and apologized, looking pitiful as she did so.

“No, no, please don’t apologize, Miss Yui. It is clearly his fault for duping you, I don’t blame you at all.” Kenshin said before exhaling a breath and then gritted his teeth, ‘damn you Joy, to even manipulate my friends like that… I will not let you off easily. Just you wait.’