Chapter Text
They hadn’t cut his hair yet… Giriko’s mind drifted off petting the soft blonde, playing with it lazily as he stared down at the boy. He was supposed to be a bargaining chip, a captive the DWMA would offer something in exchange for. They weren’t offering anything. Not a huge surprise with how dispensable the academy had always been with their people. Not a shock, but now leaving them with this little kid…
Letting him go wasn’t an option, not unless they wanted to let the Academy know they could out wait Arachnophobia in a bargain to always get what they wanted. So what were they supposed to do with him now? They didn’t have prisons like the Academy, this room they were keeping him in was pretty much just thrown together out of a bunk and a new set of locks on the outside. For them, getting rid of an enemy for sure had to be through killing them. They didn’t have any other option… Did they?
The boy didn’t know how to speak, at least not in any legible way to them. It was a bit concerning for a handful of reasons and also just made him useless for gaining any knowledge from. If he even had any to begin with. Giriko hadn’t really been listening much when he got dragged in, beaten and bruised with an absolutely terrified look on his face that had long faded now. He just heard he was one of the academy’s kids before tuning out.
Giriko didn’t really do work in this section of things, and why would he? Anyone that had ever spoken to him for even a second knew he was not the one to place in charge of any kind of bargaining. The reason he was down here right now was really just because… why?
Sitting cross legged on the boy’s bed, right across from him staring him down while the boy stared right back, things just felt weird. They couldn’t speak to each other, they really only had each other’s expressions to go off of. The kid was probably even more confused than Giriko here as well, there were high fucking chances he didn’t even know who Giriko was. Hell, there was no way he knew who Giriko was. What he was really facing right now.
There was something sad about that.
All things considered, this boy had really run out of any use for them. There was nothing left and it was time to just get rid of him, pop off his little head quick for some sense of mercy. The idea of it was making Giriko’s throat feel painfully dry though. The kid’s blue eyes were staring into him, clueless and wondering, still innocent and unused to the depravities of war. Giriko wasn’t one that had a really good grasp on ages considering how fucked that had gotten for him these past fucking centuries, but the kid only looked about 8.
That was way too young.
Giriko certainly wasn’t one to ever show or care about empathy and shit… but he also wasn’t really one to feel all that much hate to people who had never fucking done anything. This kid wasn’t doing anything. He was sitting obediently, staring up at Giriko just waiting to see what would happen. They hadn’t dragged him here for doing any kind of crime, hadn’t caught him as a part of some weird evil faction or something…. He was just there. Wrong place wrong time kinda shit.
It made killing him a damn lot harder. Also just the lack of fear this boy had, not at all alarmed that he was alone in a room with someone so much bigger and someone as threatening as Giriko. There wasn’t any crying, begging, yelling, not even questions, just curious eyes wondering why they were sitting here. Why Giriko was playing with his hair.
Jolting back to awareness Giriko ripped his hand off of the boy as if it was burning. Fuck… he had… he had been getting to distracted by all of this. His off hand realization that the boy’s hair had grown in the time since they originally locked him down here had gotten him way too off topic. How had the kid even…? Why had he been letting Giriko do that? Was he really just completely ok with a weird man stroking his hair or fucking what?
“You…” Giriko wasn’t sure where he was planning on going with that, but stopped when he realized that this kid wouldn’t be able to understand whatever he’d say. Which sure enough, was proven right when the boy’s head clunked to the side, confused with having only the knowledge that the word was spoken to him . Something tiny and hesitant came out in turn, but it wasn’t anything Giriko could understand.
Things stayed silent for a bit, both of them were staring at each other, once again in this awkward standoff. No one had really sent Giriko in to kill this kid, those weren’t his commands or anything. They hadn’t really intentionally sent him in here at all.
It was more a spur of the moment kind of thing, a second where he had wanted to check if this brat was really still here. Wondering if he really still existed. Part of Giriko thought he wouldn’t have been here. That this boy had always just been a dream or something. He didn’t seem right here. Just… didn’t match. Didn’t make sense. It didn’t take a genius to note that this was certainly not somewhere a kid belonged.
Yet here he was.
The room they had thrown him in was fine, in fact pretty nice for a prisoner’s standards. Not too shocking though because the servant that ended up taking over him after Arachne had made her plans had been… very motherly. Which no doubt had to have been a whiplash for the poor fuck that had just been dragged into a strange castle with his head half busted in and people shouting and grumbling in foreign words that were clearly about him.
An undoubtedly terrifying experience that he was handling pretty well, at least was at this point. Giriko wondered if they had that servant who had taken him off with a big smile and some cooing to thank for this kid being so cooperative now, or if the boy just had bravery that was off the charts here. Giriko could honestly see it being either way.
Scratching his stubble Giriko thought about how to start this conversation. Well, not really conversation, more interaction. What did he even want to get across to this kid? What did he want to do to him? To do with him? That sounded nicer. It wasn’t like that Giriko was really looking to eat him alive or anything.
The first step he guessed was trying to get some sort of understanding between them, even on the most simple levels.
“Nose.” The word came out of nowhere and as well as the contact, Giriko reaching out to poke the boy’s nose as he said it. This was really a shot in the dark.
“Na-Os?” The kid’s voice sounded so unbelievably mangled, so foreign to the point that Giriko struggled to figure out that the boy was even attempting to mimic him. It was terrible, but it also showed a desire to learn. Trying to respond, trying to say words, he was trying, and that was really all Giriko could ask for in such a situation.
“Yes. Nose.” Touching his own nose this time Giriko fucking prayed it’d get across. That he’d figured out how to teach this kid at least one word.
“Naaos.” Very stretched out, but closer. Close enough actually. It wasn’t like nose was a very important word, Giriko was just looking for anything here. Any bridge he could possibly create in this blank silence between them. The boy seemed to understand the goal here well enough anyway. Not perfection, just connection.
“Yes. Do you know ‘yes’?” From the look in the boy’s eyes… no he didn’t.
“Ehsu.” The repeat came again instantly, not knowing the word but trying his best to get some sort of grasp on it. It was closer, but still pretty jumbled. Giriko sighed before continuing.
“Yes.” It was amazing how the boy’s eyebrows wrinkled dramatically, really thinking and trying to hear that word right. He was old enough to be able to do this, to learn and understand why he should be learning, but he also wasn’t grasping it much. Not that that was surprising, Giriko probably wouldn’t be doing great in the reverse either.
“Esu.” The kid said it confidently this time, as if he was sure he got it… Giriko’s lips twitched into an awkward smile. This was already proving to be far harder than it should be. It almost felt hopeless, made Giriko think he was making a mistake even trying…
“Yes.”
“Yaesu?”
“Good enough.” From the tone, the boy seemed to realize Giriko was giving him acceptance, perhaps even praise and perked up. It was cute… pointing at the kids nose the kid jumped a little in surprise, but got the message.
“Naos.” Giriko felt a wave of relief and amazement and happiness all at once with how the boy just seemed to get it. Answering perfectly to what Giriko had intended him to, and showing the capability here. Showing they had a chance to bridge this gap, that it was possible.
“Yes.” It was a bit of a lifeline there, Giriko crossing all his fingers that the boy would get it and realize what exactly ‘yes’ meant. There was a second of silence… and then the boy nodded. Seemingly understanding but also thinking very hard about something else. Apparently very very hard, because when another second passed the boy jumped up and ran to another side of the room.
At first Giriko was just taken aback, unsure what the fuck he possibly could’ve done here that would suddenly make this kid so afraid… but then he realized the boy was looking for something, trying to climb up drawers to get up to a bag sitting atop it all. He wasn’t having much luck and Giriko also did not want to deal with a brat breaking his head in today, so he quickly ran over to get the bag himself.
The boy didn’t seem to mind, just making grabby hands to say he wanted it. Which had already been obvious but now Giriko was hesitant. He wasn’t sure why, if there was anything truly dangerous in the bag then they wouldn’t have let this kid keep it… but his insistence was worrying. It made it obvious that whatever was in here was important… Giriko wasn’t sure he was ready to deal with that.
Whether he was or wasn’t didn’t matter though because the boy jumped up and grabbed onto it, getting the bag to the ground so he could start to dig through it. Random shit came out, stuff that Giriko quickly realized had to have been on the boy when they first got him. Stuff they couldn’t throw out because if they had gotten their bargain deal, the Academy would certainly want their kid in the same condition he came in.
It was mainly coins, the knotted muddy fabric of his old clothes, a cross that caught Giriko’s hypercritical attention for a second- and then the boy was jumping in his face again. Taking him so off guard he tripped back and needed a goddamn second to slow his heart rate back down. The boy didn’t really give him that chance, instead forcing a little piece of? Metal? Paper? No, what was that? Brat was moving it around too much!
Finally grabbing the boy’s little arms he got the stupid thing to stop moving, recognizing it as a name tag. A little worker tag or perhaps nursery tag to make sure he didn’t get lost or forgotten…
“Justin?” The frantic nodding and Justin’s pointing at himself made Giriko’s chest go tight.
“Yaes!”