"Aw man, why the heck does that guy keep calling me that?" Luke whined loudly while marching into the room, Mieu not too far behind.

"Why does who keep calling you what, Luke?" asked Natalia, looking up from a large pot that was sitting atop a stove. She was in the middle of stirring a brown stew of questionable quality. The stew had large chucks of purple, orange, and red things floating on the top.

"Natalia, pay attention," Tear chided, "Do not get distracted while cooking."

"Huh? Oh!" Natalia exclaimed as the pot burst into flames and released a suspiciously skull-shaped plume of black smoke. "Oh no, not again!"

Ion and Anise, who were sitting at a table in the center of the room, paled slightly.

"Did you see that smoke, Ion?" Anise whispered to the Fon Master. Ion just nodded nervously.

"Hey, don't ignore me!" Luke said. Tear and Natalia just continued to ignore him, fretting over the pot. Seeing that Tear and Natalia were going to be busy for a while, Luke turned his sights on Anise and Ion. "Hey, you two."

"Yes, my darling Luke, whatever do you need?" Anise said and jumped to her feet, clasping her hands in front of herself.

"I want to know why that bastard Asch keeps calling me a 'dreak'! What the hell is a dreak anyways?" Luke said.

"Uh…" Anise paused, thinking hard to see if she ever remembered anybody but Asch saying it. "I don't know. Do you know what it means, Ion?"

"No… I'm sorry but I don't know either…" Ion trailed off and then looked back at Luke, "Perhaps you could ask Jade…? Guy also might know what it means."

"I already tried asking Jade. All he did was laugh and get all vague, he even told me to use a dictionary!" Luke replied, looking steamed. "And Guy didn't know either!"

"Then you should listen to Jade and use a dictionary," Natalia chimed in, finally done putting out her stew, "I'll even help you look it up. I'm a bit curious about the word myself."

"Now that you mention it, so am I! I want to know what dreck means!" Anise added, not noticing Jade walk in. Jade was, in fact, not noticed by anyone but Tear.

"I suppose that I am rather curious as well… What about you, Fon Master?" Tear said and looked at Ion.

"Well… not really, I'm sure that it's something derogatory…" Ion replied while shaking his head softly.

"But that's why I want to know!" Anise grinned mischievously.

"Why would you want to know a derogatory word, Anise? My, it almost seems as if you have a secret dark-side…" Jade said suddenly, startling everyone in the room except for Tear.

"Oh… uh… But you know me better than that, Colonel…" Anise said, her mischievous look had turned to a startled look, but was now fading to an awkward one. Jade simply walked past her and Anise stuck her tongue out at his back.

"Geez, Jade, stop doing that, would you! You nearly gave me a heart attack!" Luke yelped and pointed an accusing finger at Jade. Jade just smiled and replied with: "My apologies, but I'd assumed everyone had seen me walk in. It seems as if I have overestimated the amount of awareness that you all have."

"When you put it that way… it just reminds us of how much stronger we need to get…" Natalia sighed.

"Now, what were you all discussing?" Jade asked.

Luke explained to Jade that they were all curious about what the word dreck meant because Asch kept calling him it.

"Not that you're any help…" Luke added in a grumble.

"But if you use a dictionary, it will help you learn more." Jade said simply.

"Screw that! You should look it up for me!" Luke shot back.

"Luke, that's rude!" Natalia scolded him as Jade replied that he wouldn't learn anything if he didn't do it himself.

"Ah, Jade, you're just afraid that your picture will be under the word 'villain'." Guy said cheerfully as he walked in with a large book.

Everyone looked up as Guy dropped the book in the middle of the table with a loud thump. It was a light green in color and had the word 'Kimlascan Dictionary' printed on the cover and the spine. Everyone walked over and gathered around it.

"Good thinking, Guy." Natalia said as Guy stepped aside and shoved Luke toward it. Guy turned to see Natalia standing right next to him, with Tear on his other side and paled.

"Argh..!" Guy shouted and jumped back away from them.

"Hey, what are you- wait a minute! I'm not using a dictionary!" Luke declared and crossed his arms.

"Luke, it isn't that hard unless…" Tear trailed off and got a worried look, "Luke, are you… unable to read?"

"Of course I can! I just don't like to." Luke answered shortly.

"Stop being difficult, Luke, and open to the D Section." Natalia instructed.

"While you're at it, look up villain in the V Section." Guy chuckled.

"No way." Luke grumbled and started backing up from the book, only to find Natalia and Tear standing directly behind him. Both of them were giving him looks.

"H-Hey…" Luke trailed off weakly as Jade said something about Luke having two such dominating women after him. Anise discreetly gave Natalia and Tear the evil eye.

After a few more seconds of this, Luke finally cracked. "Okay, okay…" Luke grumbled and opened the dictionary to the F Section by accident. He flipped back a bunch of pages as Anise pushed past Natalia and Tear and hovered over his shoulder.

"Ebony… no," Luke muttered to himself and turned back a few more pages, "Darkness… dementia… no…"

"There it is!" Anise said and pointed to it. Everyone except Jade and Ion leaned over Luke to see.

"Move your hand so I can read it! Hey, get off my back everyone." Luke grumbled as everyone hesitantly backed off. "Okay… Dreck: N. Slang, trash, especially inferior merchandise… That bastard!"

"Hey, it says right here that in Ancient Ispanian it means 'shit.'" Anise giggled for a second, then stopped. "I mean, that's horrible! How could anyone say that about Luke?"

"Exactly!" Luke agreed.

"Well Luke," Guy chuckled, "It sounds like something you don't want to step in, and if you do, you'd be walking funny for the next hour trying to scrape it off your foot."

Natalia covered her mouth at that and looked away, briefly amused by the mental image of Asch attempting to scrape Luke off his boot.

"Now we need to look at villain." Guy decided. Anise nodded in agreement as Luke started flipping ahead.

"Here it is!" Luke said triumphantly.

Suddenly Luke's proud face turned into one of utter confusion.

"What is it, Luke?" asked Tear.

"Is Jade actually in there?" Guy asked and leaned over Luke's shoulder, then got a startled look. Guy and Luke slowly looked at Jade, who raised an eyebrow.

Jade walked forward and stood next to Luke to see the dictionary. Upon seeing what was on it, he just covered his face with one hand and sighed.

"What is it, Jade?" Ion asked, looking slightly worried.

"It is worse than I feared…" Jade replied.

"Who is it already, Colonel!" Anise demanded as Luke turned to face everyone and held up the dictionary.

It was Emperor Peony.

(A.N. I really don't know why I'm doing so many Tales of the Abyss one-shots... I'm just getting insperation for that right now. I promise I'll upload another chapter of Recollection next.

And yes, that is actually the definition of dreck if your curious. It's Yiddish slang for shit, trash, poop, ect. I even got the first part, the part that Luke reads, directly from . As for the part about Emperor Peony... it is a Kimlascan dictionary after all. Also, I was trying to think about who was a bigger troll then Jade. Then it hit me: his boss!)