NOVGO.NET Chapter 1098: We Build Again IV
Chapter 1098: We Build Again IV
Gaia hummed rather happily as she skipped through the halls.
She hummed audibly to herself and with the added clinking of her favorite jewelry, it was like her world was full of music.
“Why are you so happy..?” Bashenga trailed behind her slightly, somehow even more quiet than normal.
Gaia spun around with a relaxed look on her face. “Hmm… no reason, I suppose. But it might have something to do with the fact that this is the first time you have voluntarily sought me out on your own. And you’re not even yelling at me!”
Bashenga looked away in mild annoyance. “…It’s not the first time.”
“Well even if it isn’t, do you see how it happens so rarely that I could make that mistake?”
Bashenga did, in fact, see her point.
“Well, I had no choice but to seek you out since you haven’t come back to the room in some time.”
Gaia’s face twitched unconsciously as if she were having a stroke.
“What in the seven hells is wrong with you..?” Bashenga was starting to get worried.
“S-Sorry, it’s just… you’re seeking me out and waiting for me to come back in the same day, and I think it might have overloaded my brain.”
“I’m not a frigid enough person to warrant this kind of reaction.”
“Remind me again, when’s the last time you hugged your dad?”
“Four years ago. It was his requested Christmas present.” Belloc did not understand the correlation.
Gaia stared at him blankly.
“…Playing my words back in my mind, I hear them now.”
“I was hoping you would.”
Bashenga daringly intruded into Gaia’s personal space. Her entire body nearly turned scarlet.
He lifted a hand to her face and gently brushed aside the hair covering her left eye.
Gaia still bore a rather a rather bitter-looking scar from the venom that splashed on her face.
Bashtnga’s heart clenched from the sight. Gaia suddenly became timid.
“Y-Your mother is making me a salve to help with the scarring. By tomorrow, I should be my perfectly normal and radiant self.” She smiled cheerfully.
Her bright demeanor didn’t exactly help Bashenga’s mood improve.
“This never should have happened.”
“Oh, there’s no need for any sour faces. I was the one who made the decision to join the battle, and I accepted every possible outcome in doing so. I am alive at least, so there’s nothing to be remorseful about-”
“There will be retribution for this, I swear. Percival will pay with everything he has to give.”
In the face of a clear and apparent threat on someone else’s life, Gaia smiled like it was the most romantic thing she’d ever heard.
“…Be careful now, young man. Talk like that might make a woman think you have some real feelings for her.” Gaia chuckled.
Instead of shrugging off Gaia’s words with a casual eye-roll, Bashenga stared at her calculatively.
He chose his next words very carefully before speaking.
“Do you… think I have no memories of the time we spent together? That I have no attachment to you..?”
Gaia’s cheeks became redder and redder. “Well, I know you do, but I thought this was more of a friend/roommate thing..?”
Bashenga swallowed.
“…Maybe that’s not all it has to be.”
Even the air was in disbelief over the words flowing through it.
Unsure of what to make of things, Gaia let out a small scoff as she started to turn around.
“You’re just saying that because you’re still in shock. You almost lost your mother, and you were in your first fight in years, so you’re looking for something warm and fuzzy to cling to, and-”
“Do you think I am that flippant?”
Gaia froze in her tracks. The atmosphere between the two became heavier.
“I… don’t know.” She admitted. “You like to pretend that you don’t need comfort, but you are the single most comfort-seeking man I’ve ever met. And I am something familiar to you, and comfortable, and maybe that would be a good thing if… we didn’t just have the day we just had.”
Bashenga nodded slowly. “You think I’m using you.” He realized.
Gaia hated to admit it. “I mean… doesn’t it make sense?”
Bashenga couldn’t really deny that. Today’s events had certainly rattled him, just as they had for everyone in the house.
It made perfect sense for him to gravitate towards something sweet, comforting, and familiar.
He couldn’t blame Gaia for questioning his motivations. Perhaps if he were in her same position, he would be just as skeptical.
Hell, he was unsure about the things he was saying himself. But there was only one way for him to make things crystal clear.
Taking a short breath, he took two steps to invade Gaia’s personal space.
Leaning down, he placed a small kiss on Gaia’s cheek.
When he pulled away, her face was slack, and a bouquet of flowers had sprouted out of her hair.
“W-W-W-W-W-Wha-Wha-Wha-Wha-Wha…??”
“I guess we’ll know better where we stand when I get back. We should revisit this conversation then.”
Bashenga moved past Gaia, who was completely stuck in place and unable to get any of her words out.
It was a pity that she couldn’t turn around in time. She would have loved to see the genuine smile on his face.
–
“Where is it… where is it…”
The sound of metal hitting the floor was all that could be heard in Karliah’s bedroom.
As she rustled through a chest, she started pulling out everything from maces to heavy halberds that were twice the size of her body.
And yet, Karliah still couldn’t find what she was looking for.
“Havin’ some trouble there, ma?”
Karliah looked over her shoulder in true surprise.
Bekka was sprawled in her bed, wearing an unusual smile. She was the very last thing that her mother had ever expected to see.
No one ever really came into Karliah’s room, as a matter of fact. Everyone in the house was petrified of what they might witness inside.
“Hey, kiddo…. The hell are you doing in here?”
“Just coming in here to check on you, mama. I wanted to see how you were handling everything.”
Karliah’s face soured. “Bah, don’t come in here with any of that daffodil shit, girlie. You know it takes a lot more than some whiny little shit to get the better of me. They don’t make bitches tougher than your mom nowadays… They don’t make them fine like me either, but that’s another story.”
Bekka laughed in earnest. “Well, at least you were kind enough to pass some of the fine down instead of keeping it all for yourself.”
“I know, right? And Yara and Imani think they’re the only maternal ones in this house!” Karliah made an unkind gesture with her finger.
The mother-daughter duo laughed together. It was a happy, light sound that could only have come from their bright personalities.
But Karliah noticed that Bekka was still staring at her hard.
In a moment that was quite unlike her, Karliah placed her hand on her daughter’s shoulder and spoke in a softer voice than normal.
“Are you sure you’re alright, kid? You seemed a little different since earlier.”
Bekka smiled wryly and placed her hand over her mother’s.
“I dunno… just got worried I might’ve lost you there, ma. Who knows what that asshole could have done..?”
“More like what I could have done to his asshole if he tried something.”
“Mama.”
“Fine, fine…” Karliah sighed as she went back to rummaging through her chest.
“I guess you being concerned about me is nice and shit, but I really don’t need you to waste your energy on that, kid. If you’re really in need of something to do, help me find my goddamned iklwa…”
Bekka flinched.
“I swear to god I put it in here, but I can’t find it for anything…” Karliah continued. Growing desperate, she stuck her head in the chest and began trying to coax her weapon out of hiding. “Here, little stabby-stabby… Big-Mama doesn’t want to go horror hunting without you.”
“What if you didn’t go?” Bekka suddenly said.
Karliah scoffed and laughed off her remark. “As if I would miss a chance to get out and explore a bit. I gotta make sure I get stronger than that runt Kanami too, so that I can pay her pint-size ass back for punching me.”
“Mama…”
“You know, she thinks she can do whatever she wants because she’s fucking hot. But if I ever get my hands on her or her husband, I’ll have them trained so good they won’t-”
“I’d like it if you didn’t go with everyone else.”
“Yeah, and I’d like a good rimjob, but all i’ve been matching with lately is fucking prudes who act like they’re scared to lick a little..”
Karliah’s eyes widened as her daughter’s words finally sank in.
She turned around slowly and stared at Bekka with a look of incredulity.
“….Ass.” She finished.
Bekka took a deep breath.
“I think that with everything that’s been going on lately, going to run around the multiverse is the last thing you need to be doing. I want you to stay with me and the others so that I can protect you.”
Karliah was many things. But a sheltered sheep wasn’t one of them.
Earlier in the day, she couldn’t place why Bekka’s treatment of her had changed.
But now she knew. Her daughter was afraid of losing her. So much so that she was willing to stand in her way.
It should have been the time for a conversation and reassurance.
But Karliah was feeling so many new things at once that she didn’t know how to process them.
So, she decided to do what she did best.
Meet uncertainty with anger.