"Wait...

Why am I looking at Tatsumi this way?

It seems I just can't ignore him." -Chelsea

*Slam*

The result of a aggressively closed door resonated through the air, the sound of flapping wings following behind it. Some nearby birds quickly soared to the bleak cloud-filled sky on instinct. Tatsumi stomps out to the woods adjacent from the warm and lit up shelter he finds no longer suitable to be in for the time being. Passing through, he finds himself still in sight of the new Night Raid base, switching his pace from walking to jogging and eventually to running.

His vision is blurred from a substance in his eyes, with some of it leaking out and trailing down his face.

It was tears. He was crying, but what for?

As he runs through the woods he loses his footing, causing him to miss the proceeding step and drops him down onto the relatively damp dirt, accompanied by a thud. A hushed grunt is heard, before Tatsumi picks himself back up and keeps running the same direction, albeit his speed has reduced substantially. He's injured his knee, evidenced by a missing piece of clothing on his left leg. Tatsumi finds himself a reasonable distance from the house Susanoo built and stops, ignoring the throbbing pain in his knee.

He turns his head looking at his surroundings. The moonlight hardly shines down onto the ground below, making the woods dim. Other than his panting, it was peaceful. He gently lowers himself using his left hand as support and promptly sits against the base of the tree, placing both of his arms on his knees. His dried tears left a somewhat crusty feeling on his cheeks.

Attempting to calm himself, he inhales and exhales slowly before a wave of conflicting emotions begins to fill his conscious. A mixture of hatred, despair, jealousy, and murderous intent surrounds and feeds his mind as he starts to hyperventilate. Tears once again trickle from his eyes downward, and eventually begins to pour. He breaks down, placing his hands on his face and sniffles before screaming his heart out into the uncaring woods.

It hurts.

His thoughts without a doubt is a very loose translation of what he truly felt. He'd ask himself why, but refuses to answer his own question.

Tatsumi.

That's all she could think of right now.

Following his rampage and exit, she threw a look of disgust towards Lubbock and Mine and turns away, proceeding to head out the same way Tatsumi left. As she's in the process of heading towards the door, Mine places her hands against her face, clearly upset. Lubbock attempts to comfort her, rubbing her back but refusing to acknowledge his existence, she continues to cry. Loud and quick thumps are heard, and become louder before they stop completely.

Chelsea turns around and sees two familiar figures, quickly identifying them as Najenda and Akame. They ran downstairs to investigate all the commotion. With Najenda in front of Akame, Akame vaults over the staircase handles and Najenda steps forward, raising her eyebrow.

Akame runs towards Mine with a concerned look and kneels down in front of her, asking what's wrong and what happened while Najenda looks at Chelsea with a questioning stare. Chelsea just closes her eyes in disappointment, before turning back and opening the door. A rush of cold air breaks the pleasant warm air, and she runs out to the front of the base.

Stopping to find Tatsumi, she turns her head left to right before seeing Tatsumi's dark figure disappear into the woods. She takes off attempting to follow behind him, realizing that she won't see him but she can follow the path he's leaving behind.

After following the path for about three minutes, she didn't think of how fast he was as she was starting to tire herself. Sprinting for three minutes in the dark relying on his trail and stopping every now and then to make sure she's following the correct route was taking a small physical toll, becoming fatigued. She notices his trail fading slightly as she continues to run up, before she hears a scream, stopping her in her tracks.

Tatsumi?

She recognizes the voice behind the scream and the distance from the origin behind his scream, but it wasn't like anything she's heard before. It wasn't his battle cry. It wasn't his resolve that he embraces and shares constantly.

It was pain and agony.

She intakes a small amount of air as her heart begins to ache. She's never felt so much sorrow for one person. Placing her right hand on her heart, she was intent on finding him and...

She wasn't too sure. Making her way and accounting the distance, Tatsumi was nearby. Tracing back the sounds, she looks upon his faded trail adjusting to the right behind a tree. Listening for any signs of him, she looks at the tree in front of her. The sniffles and his audible misery. He was behind that one.

Taking careful steps, she puts her left hand over her mouth. Unsure why, realization dawns upon her. Her eyes start to water slightly. Lacking the amount of light in the woods, her eyes were camouflaged behind a mask of darkness. Her knees lock into place, unable to move. Her courage to go near him disappears and Tatsumi's distinct cries continue to press on. While listening to his cries, her feelings get demolished bit by bit.

Gathering the courage but unable to speak any words, she shakily moves to the right of the tree where the noise of torment lies.

With a glimmer of hope to see him recovering, she was shattered. She should've known better. Peeking from the side, she sees him sitting against the base of the tree criss-cross, hands covering his face with his head down. It was a completely degrading sight. Her small crush at the lowest he can be.

She continues to peer at him, her face becomes flushed as a mental battle takes place within her mind, whether to comfort him, leave him be or stay where she was. Shaking her head, she moves around the tree toward him before he mumbles something behind his loud sniffles, forcing her to stop. Questioning herself, she moves until she's directly beside him without him acknowledging her presence. She slowly sits down beside him, bending her knees before sitting, extending her legs. Instinctively she would adjust her skirt, but in the presence of the one she cannot take her mind off of, that was the least of her concerns.

Resisting the urge to comfort him, she stays in place right beside him. She brings her knees close to her, wrapping her arms around her legs.

Ten minutes has passed since Chelsea sat right beside the decimated Tatsumi. He has quiet down, reducing the amount of noise he created to mere sniffles. Staying by his side, Chelsea stares forward lost in thought.

He takes a deep breath, removing his hands from his face. His eyes were red and moist with tears, with his hands quickly drying off the tears. He raises his head, looking around before spotting a familiar auburn-colored girl to his right. His eyes wide open, he stares at her and moves a bit back. She notices this and her head shoots up, looking toward Tatsumi.

"Hey." Chelsea greets him with a slight smirk, looking to brighten the mood.

"Hey." Tatsumi replied, returning her attempt to make him feel better with a small smile.

She alters her body to face Tatsumi, both her knees now on the ground in a seiza sitting position. He inspects her as she adjusts herself. Wearing her signature butterfly headphone set, red checkered miniskirt and white long-sleeved shirt with a black vest over it. She was a pretty sight to see beside him, though he felt relatively awkward to be with her in this state. He continues to eye Chelsea as she sits up, facing towards him. She tilts her head and notices Tatsumi's eyes were roaming, but focused on her figure.

*thump*

...

A blush forms on her cheeks as she lightly tapped his head once.

"What're you looking at?"

"..." No reply.

She chops Tatsumi's head with her hand with a favorable result. Slightly wincing, he held his head and began to rub the spot where she hit.

"Hey! What the hell was that for?" Tatsumi questioned her angrily. She shook her head in response.

"You weren't talking."

"That doesn't mean you get to hit me!" She shrugs in response, turning her head to the right to hide her previously unquestioned blush. A smile was hidden

"Hey, I'm talking to you!"

"Oi, Chelsea!" Tatsumi desperately yet playfully yells at her. Forgetting about the pain, he grabs her shoulders and moves her back and forth.

She smiled. She was enjoying teasing him with a bit of silent treatment, restraining herself from chuckling.

He's happy...As if he completely forgot. Chelsea thought, deciding it best that she keeps it that way. She turns around quickly, Tatsumi reacting as his arms go up as if he was about to get hit. He closes his eyes and awaits his doom but nothing happens. He opens his eyes deliberately, and instead sees a smiling Chelsea. He lowers his arms, therefore lowering his guard.

*flick*

He closes his eyes in reaction to getting flicked on the nose and opens them, ready to flick her back. He sees a standing Chelsea ready to dash. Quickly leaning forward as best he can, he stretches his arm out to grab her ankle before she gets away. His quick reaction paid off when wanting to play a game of cat and mouse, she fell to the ground face first with a loud thud. Realizing he might've hurt her, he crawls over to the fallen Chelsea.

"Chelsea! Are you okay?" He investigates her figure, before rolling her to so she faces up. Expecting to see a bruise or some kind of bleeding, he was left with a knocked out Chelsea.

"Fuck! Chelsea!" He moves up to her face, grabbing onto her shoulders and moving them in an attempt to wake her up. "Chelsea!" He shakes her desperately before slamming a fist into the ground in frustration.

Other than fucking up on other things like forgetting to zip up his pants, he hasn't felt so much dread as she was the only person who came up to him. That is until he realized she was giggling.

You've got to be kidding me. Tatsumi gives a sigh of relief.

He lets go of her shoulders while her hand covers up her mouth as she giggles. He pouts, turning around and now felt like a fool.

"That wasn't funny." He states shaking his head, with the giggling Chelsea unable to compose herself. She sits up and moves behind her fooled target, before wrapping her arms around him. Surprised at the sudden show of affection, he looks to his right to a now close-up view of Chelsea's face before accepting her pleasant embrace, grabbing her hand and closing his eyes enjoying the moment. He's never felt so warm before, feeling queasy to such an unexpected display. She lightly tightens her hug, her warm breath felt along Tatsumi's shoulder.

"It was." She agreed with herself, giggling once more. Tatsumi shakes his head with disapproval, though with a grin.

Back at the base of the tree, Chelsea leans against Tatsumi's shoulder while he ponders. She looks up at him and wonders what he could be thinking about. The situation in the base may have angered Tatsumi, but he was one to quickly move on. That wasn't the case now. Revenge fills Tatsumi's mind, reminded of the events that took place in the base a few hours before. He grits his teeth with rage, before opening his mouth and breathing in, in an attempt to calm himself once more.

Sweet~

Eh? Tatsumi stops thinking and was met with a object in his mouth.

His mouth closes with some kind of outside force and was met with a layer of dry sweetness, a white stick protruding out of his mouth. His eyes look down towards the one responsible.

It's a lollipop. He looks at Chelsea with a blush now on her face, she flashes a smile, a lollipop in her mouth as well.

"Mm, thanks." He nods in approval, the accompanied taste was strawberry. Not his personal favorite but a nice treat to have.

"Tatsumi?"

"Mm."

"We should head back."

"No." Tatsumi disapproved, obviously the situation beforehand didn't end well, but he wasn't ready to go back yet.

"You know why. I can't see her again." Tatsumi tightened his fist on his right hand, Chelsea noticed this and placed her hand on his fist, and he looked at her questioningly. She looked up at her crush with lustful eyes.

If I can just push him...

She can feel the temptation to take advantage of recent events, wanting him.

"You know she never loved you, right?" She asked in a quiet voice.

Tatsumi ceased all movements and his breathing became laboured.

"What?" He looked at her, his eyes staring down at the somewhat horny Chelsea, though not realizing what's at play.

"She left you. When Lubbock took her to the bedroom, she did not have a care in the world regarding how you felt." She picked her words carefully, unable to relate but remain safe, wanting Tatsumi. She hasn't felt such a need for someone in a long time, her heartrate increasing as she continued to berate Mine. He remained silent for a minute, and quietly asked for confirmation.

"Are you sure, Chelsea?" She nods. Tatsumi recalls the event where he asked Mine out, and how she loved him. Yet now she treated him like a dog, and even swore that they would die for eachother.

She's not wrong. What is this? Why do I bother even debating about whether or not I regret anything? His eyes wander to Chelsea's, and it clicked.

She wants you. You've yet to consider anyone else and Esdeath was just a forced relationship. You never asked anything from her, but she is here, wanting to be yours. Mine has already gone beyond the boundaries BOTH of us set. Look at her eyes...

His breathing slowed, and he puts his hand on Chelsea's face. Satisfied with his answer, she stands up, his hand releasing her and she sits on his lap, straddling him. He initially protests, attempting to stand up but with no avail. She pushes his chest towards the tree.

"Uh-" She places a finger on his lips, shushing him and he complied. She slowly takes the lollipop out of his mouth and wraps her arms around him, bringing her forehead closer to his. He follows suit, grabbing onto her back and pulling her closer. She gasped at such an assertive move. She presses her body against his, finally connecting her lips with his. Closing her eyes, she moves her hips forward and backward grinding against Tatsumi's crotch.

"Nm~" He grunts in pleasure as he opens his mouth a little and slips his tongue into her mouth. She smiled, before biting his lip and proceeding to fight his dominant side. Her desire to have him builds up as she continues to writhe Tatsumi's tongue, though he however maintains his presence in her mouth, rubbing his tongue along hers. Their own lust heats the air around them, both knowing what they want of each other. Pulling back to tease him, Tatsumi follows her as he leans forward to prevent her from escaping his grasp.

She wraps her arms around his neck, breaking the kiss but not without purring in his ear, shivers climbing up his spine because of her request.

"I want you, Tatsumi."