Witch Hunter Robin Fan Fiction ❯ Miracle ❯ Chapter IV ( Chapter 4 )

Miracle:

Chapter 4

~*~

Both Amon and Robin remained silent for the first part of the drive back to Touko's apartment. Robin stared out the window beside her, while Amon stared out of the windshield in front of him, both seemingly lost in their own thoughts.

Every so often, however, Amon's eyes would flicker to the slender form sitting next to him and he would catch her hand straying to her lower stomach. Her facial expression did not change, but her hand would rest below her abdomen a moment, before quickly diverting itself to the leather of the seat beside her. The entire process repeated itself several times before Amon broke the silence.

"You tested negative for any STDs."

Robin nodded, but didn't reply, and the silence continued for quite some time until she eventually asked, "Where are we going?"

"I'm taking you back to your apartment," Amon told her, not even bothering to look at her. The road spun itself out before them and he fixed his eyes mechanically on the dark asphalt. The young doctor and his words were still fresh in the dark hunter's mind and wouldn't allow themselves to be forgotten, not even for a moment.

And this made him slightly uneasy; being affected this much and allowing it to make him unsettled were both in themselves prospects that made his blood roar.

Flicking a lock of black hair out of his eyes, he eased up on the gas pedal, then stepped on the brake. The apartment building where Robin lived now loomed up before them and Amon turned to the young girl, watching as she seemed to mentally steel herself, then step out of the car.

She walked around the car and leaned down by Amon's window, forcing the other hunter to put it down to hear what she had to say.

"Thank you, Amon." And in a rustle of black skirts, she had turned and fled up the stairs to her apartment.

Putting the window back up, Amon leaned back against the black leather seat of his car and collected his momentarily scattered thoughts. Someplace he had wanted to go…someplace…

Sitting up abruptly, he gripped the wheel and pulled back out onto the street. Even as his thoughts drifted to what he was about to do, his body automatically took him to where he needed to go without much conscious thought. The place was familiar too him, perhaps too much so for the dark hunter and his car sped towards his mind's destination seemingly on its own.

~*~

The desk was smooth and cool beneath his aged fingertips and the glowing computer monitor before him was humming quietly. The modern office, with it's sleek design and nearly impenetrable security gave Zaizen a feeling of power and control, one that he couldn't get elsewhere, not even by lording over those STN-J brats he was forced to command.

Grimacing, he ran his fingertips over the desktop once again, then moved them to the control device for the computer. His fingertips tapped irritably as his eyes scanned the day old information, waiting impatiently for the arrival of one of his head scientists and the report he would bring with him.

The old man didn't have to wait much longer; footsteps amplified by the emptiness of his office sounded in his ears and his head shot up, almost eagerly. The man striding toward him was young, but one of his top scientists in the genetic field of research. There were only two other people he would have trusted more with something like this, and one of them was dead.

"Well?" he prompted impatiently, barely waiting for the man to come to a halt before his desk.

Shaking locks of red-brown hair out of his eyes, the man offered a file to the older man and watched with carefully veiled irritation as it was greedily snatched from his hands. "The tests are positive…" There was a slight air of satisfaction about the doctor's tone, as if he were taking personal pride in a job well done.

"Excellent, excellent." Zaizen's mood kept improving with every sentence he read and with every word that came from his scientist's mouth. I hardly dared to hope the project would start off this soon, much less this well. Aloud, he answered, "Brilliant, Dr. Nakano, brilliant. 'Project Purgatory' seems to have gotten off to a fairly good start."

He paused and glanced up at the tall young man before him. Chocolate brown eyes, that had been so warm and caring just hours earlier that day, now glittered with a gruesome sense of satisfaction as the man received praise for what was becoming his career altering project. "Keep up this standard of work and I can easily see you as Factory superintendent. You've got the brains and the leadership; keep it up."

"Thank you, sir," Umeda Nakano said, bowing his head a little to the aging Factory boss. "If you'll excuse me, I'll be getting back to my work." A small smirk crossed his handsome young face. "We've got a lot of work to do and only nine months in which to do it."

Nodding, Zaizen turned back to the papers and Nakano left, his white lab coat billowing out a little behind his slender form.

A few minutes later, the papers rustled loudly as their holder set them back down on the desk, rubbing tired eyes and stifling an undignified yawn which threatened to split his face in two. Rising with the aid of his cane, he shut off the computer and slipped the papers into his locked drawer. No use exercising a bit of caution; if those files fell into the wrong hands, his pet project would be ruined.

The Devil's Child, supposedly be a superior witch, a witch that would save her race and resurrect the so-called 'gods' of old…How ironic that one Robin Sena would be destroying the race she was supposed to save.

This thought made Takuma Zaizen smile as he left the Factory for the night, his slightly stooped form moving slowly, even with the help of the cane.

How good it would feel to know that he had saved the world from those monsters known as Witches.

~*~

"Mr. Nagira isn't here at the moment, I'm afraid. You'll have to take a number if you want to see him." The secretary's sarcasm wasn't unnoticed by Amon, just ignored.

"Thank you," he replied, not really meaning it at all. He turned and left quickly, just as he had came.

Raising an eyebrow, Hana watched him go and shrugged to herself. It wasn't her problem. But what to do about Mr. Nagira…

"I'm going to get gray hair before I'm 30…" she muttered, rubbing her temples and turning back to her back-logged computer.

Amon's car now changed direction slightly, aiming towards his half-brother's private place of residence. Another place he was all too familiar with.

In all brutal honesty, there was no real love lost between the two. The opposing viewpoints of the two had wedged a rift between them that neither had tried very hard to bridge. Or wanted to. They didn't outright hate each other, but the brotherly companionship that most felt with their siblings was absent in their relationship.

Screeching to a half outside his brothers apartment complex, Amon parked his black car and got out, locking it behind him and making sure he had his extra set of keys to Nagira's apartment. His steps were quick on the uncarpeted stairs and his dark form moved swiftly down the hall to the well-known, weathered door.

Without even bothering to knock, he slipped his keys into the lock and unlocked the door, shoving it open with his shoulder when it stuck a little. He stepped into the tiny front hallway and shut the door loudly behind him, slipping off his shoes and entering the main part of the house.

He found his older half-brother half on, half off the couch, his head resting on the cushions and the rest of his body slouched on the floor. There were bags under his eyes and his clothes were wrinkled and dirty; Amon had seen murder victims that looked better then his brother. Said person started a little when Amon dropped his coat on the couch next to his head.

"Did you get drunk again?" Amon asked, faint traces of what might be called disgust lingering at the edge of his tone.

"Yeah, my head feels like shit and I can't remember a damn thing from last night..." Wiry fingers rubbed at his temples as he gave his younger half-brother an odd look. "What are you doing here anyway? I know you're not here because you wanted to see me." There was no bitterness in Nagira's voice, it was an accepted fact that neither one sought out the other for social calls, an unspoken fact, but an accepted one nonetheless.

"I need to relocate a witch," Amon told him bluntly, moving into the small kitchenette area to make tea. It was sort of a routine; more often then not, when he did make his rare visits, he found his smoking, gambling, womanizing brother drunk. And if not drunk, then with a hangover.

Nagira snorted. "This from the great witch hunter Amon. What's different about this witch that makes him, or her, so special? Why help this one and kill all the others?"

"Because this one is a child."

"Oh…I see…" Nagira answered in a slightly absent voice, probably still reminiscent from his drinking bout. "How old?"

"Newborn."

"What?! A baby?! How can you make any sort of judgment on a child not even old enough to talk?!"

Setting a cup of tea down on the small table by Nagira's couch, Amon stood over his inebriated sibling and glared. "It's not even born yet."

The brown haired man's mouth dropped. "What the hell is your game, Amon?!"

"Its mother is a witch, so it's guaranteed to have powers."

"Mmm…." came the reply as Nagira drank his tea. He swallowed, then added, "What about the father?"

"Unknown. The mother was raped."

In the process of their conversation, Amon had drifted over to one of the small windows and stood looking out upon the city below. Now, a choked sound came from behind him, and he half-turned to find Nagira giving him another slightly fuzzy, disbelieving look. "Raped?! Did you tell the police? Have they found the guy?!"

"No, I didn't tell them."

"What?!" A hint of rage crept into Nagira's voice. "I understand you have your own views about witches, but this is another issue entirely! Why didn't you tell the police!"

"Because there was nothing to tell. The STN-J examined the place where she was raped and there was no evidence left behind that would suggest anything. If the Solomon agents couldn't find anything, then the police certainly won't."

With a snort, Nagira turned away from his half-brother.

"Now would you be able to find a home for the child or not?"

"I'll look into it," Nagira promised, taking another sip of his tea. "But I'm not making any guarantees or nothing, all right? And I really think you should let the police know-"

"Fine," Amon answered, cutting him off. He grabbed his coat and gave his brother another piercing look. "Your drinking habits are out of control."

Nagira merely shrugged. "There's nothing wrong with getting drunk every now and then."

Choosing to ignore that last remark, Amon turned and left, locking the door once more behind him.

~*~

When I begun writing this fic, I couldn't even begin to comprehend the amount of time, work, and thought that would go into this. Because of all the emotional conflicts and such, the chapters for this fic are being written at a slower rate then any of my other fics. This is also partly the reason why I am updating this fewer times then my other Witch Hunter Robin fic.

Please don't ever think I've quit writing this, because I haven't. I believe in finishing what I start, and I have the plot and ending all planned out. I just need to write them. I want to write this to the best of my ability, and to do that, I need time. Please just be patient with me, and I PROMISE, I will see this fic through until the end.

As always, comments and CONSTRUCTIVE suggestions are awaited with much anticipation! ^.^

~SanoGirl

P.S. One more thing…Amon is SO freakishly hard to keep in character and to have fall in love at the same time. I know he's OOC in this chapter, and I hate to say it, but it's going to get worse. I'll do my best to keep around the Amon we all know and love, but he's going to have to change at least a little…For that reason, I apologize in advance.