[FIN] Time to Talk~

[TawnyAngel]

Aulus turned to move after Izaya, tossing a pokeball over his shoulder as he went. "Char, I'm going to need that to go."

Order given Aulus headed straight after Nakura, taking the most direct route available even though that did mean ploughing through a gaggle of people he had stood dazedly in the midst of less than two minutes ago.

You had to hand it to Izaya, he had a talent.

"Paul!" the little spider popped out of his pokeball, "stop him, running man!"

Giving a little squeal of shock at the chaos he found himself in Paul got a good grip on Aulus' shoulder before firing a String Shot at Izaya's legs. He was pretty sure he recognized the human as being on their side but what Aulus said went and that was that.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

"Eh?!" The order to the man's Fire-type actually peaked Nakura's curiosity enough to warrant a glance back over his shoulder. Wonderful. Just when he thought the man had lost all sense of reason, he was telling his pokemon to save his lunch. How nice for him to have been able to do that since, unlike Nakura, Aulus didn't have to worry about Char potentially poisoning his food or eating it in his place.

...But there he went, bowling over the people still going for food. What was this, selective insanity? Or did he just really want to knock things over? This was possibly worse than being chased by Shizuo, considering at least that monster was predictable enough when it came to his rage.

What the - ?! Finding his legs constricted just before a corner turn, Nakura lost his balance and plunged to the polished tile ground, his chin skidding painfully across its smooth surface as he slid and slammed into a wall. "-OOF!"

His heart beat wildly as he tried to wrap his mind around what had just happened, wasting a few precious seconds before reaching for his flick blade and whipping it out to cut the strings that bound him.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Woops." Aulus bent down to make a grab for Izaya;s knife hand, intending to hold him fast by the wrist. "Running in the corridors is dangerous you know Nakura... now are we going to train together or not? Do you really think running away sill solve anything? All running away would do, Nakura, is give me time to get creative. Do you want to do that? Hummmm?"  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Weak in strength as he was, the grunt was not about to get his wrist broken in an attempt to win a struggle he knew was futile. Sure, it might have ended up getting broken anyway, along with a few other things, but at least it wouldn't be deliberate on his part.

Words were all he had now. But dare he speak? It seemed his last line of defense was all that stood between life and death. Or worse - loving life and wishing he were dead. One wrong word, and it would all be over.

Too bad keeping his mouth shut wasn't an option for a panicked Nakura. "Heheh...I-I think we can solve this without any unconventional..." ...cruel and unusual... "...creative methods," he croaked sheepishly, still a bit winded from his fall. "Uh...wh-where should we go to train?"  

[TawnyAngel]

The fear in Nakura's eyes was like a slap in the face and made Aulus let go of his wrist and pull back almost as though he had been struck. "I'm not going to hurt you," he said after a brief pause, to remind himself as much as anything else. Beating up somebody weaker than he was just because he was angry... no, no that wasn't something he could do.

Pressing his lips tight together, and belatedly noticing that the burst of speed had actually put a bit of a twinge in his ribs, Aulus knelt down to roughly pull the webbing away from Nakura's ankles. "We're going to one of the training rooms downstairs," he continued, wiping the stick strands off on his trousers. "We're going downstairs and we're going to talk where there aren't hundreds of other people around. Get up."

Anger was still surging through him and yes there was a part of him that just wanted to rip Izaya's head off but... but.... No. Just no.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Nakura blinked as his wrist was released. There was some serious mental trauma at work here, though it wasn't hard to guess from what. Truthfully, the grunt wouldn't have said anything at all had he not been willing to risk getting hurt, but seeing Aulus come to his senses was unexpected. Inner conflict, perhaps...? He frowned, trying to read the agent's expression. In any case, the immediate danger seemed to have passed.

"Don't bother - " he began as the scarred man knelt, but the agent had already undone the webbing. He irritably pushed himself to his feet. "Jeez...are you always this stupid?" Perhaps it was his frustration at not understanding what was going on, but a rarely evident flicker of anger flared up in Nakura. It seemed to forgo the survival instincts that had been driving him only moments before. "I'm healed better than you are, yet you're the one straining yourself. I'm not completely helpless, you know, regardless of what a muscle-head like you might believe."  

[TawnyAngel]

Aulus blinked, processing what Nakura had just said a couple of times. Stupid. Muscle-head. Did this guy have a death wish or what? The skinny little man was way beyond his comprehension, how did he manage to be do damn obnoxious?

"That's a bit hypocritical, isn't it?" he asked rhetorically with a dark scowl and an unconscious flex of his hands. "Antagonizing me isn't smart either." Maybe he shouldn't have said he wouldn't hurt him, maybe threatening him with serious bodily harm was the only way to get Narkura's attention. Aulus straightened up, unsure of the answer to that but not willing to rescind on his promise. "And I'm fine, anyway; back on duty, taking it easy isn't going to help me anymore.... Why do you care anyway? You've given me the impression today - and on the mission - that you'd enjoy seeing me suffer.

"Come on," Aulus added, jerking his thumb down the corridor. "Get up, walk, before I pick you up and carry you like the damned brat you are." Brat, that was it. Just treat him like a dumb brat and think of him as a dumb brat, don't give him the satisfaction of reacting... easier said than done.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Crossing his arms, he lifted his chin defiantly, his sights on Aulus' flexing hands. "Perhaps, but I don't usually take such risks without knowing the consequences. I may come off as foolish, but I have my reasons for everything - including giving false impressions."

He stared at the man for a minute after it'd been suggested that he'd have enjoyed watching him suffer. "Maybe that's true and maybe it's not, but you're already suffering and it's not my fault. That's no fun," he couldn't help adding with a wry, half-smirk. "As far as caring...didn't you already know that I love all humans? Why wouldn't I care about your well-being?"

Reluctant though he was, the grunt did as he was told. He was just itching to offer a retort in response to the threat of being carried, but he managed to refrain. If Aulus was making an effort to exercise some restraint, he might as well follow his example.  

[TawnyAngel]

"You have a damn funny way of showing it if that's true," Aulus growled, turning sharply, heading for the stairs with his hands still clenching and clenching at odd intervals and his jaw tight. "You seem to live to press people's buttons, why?" He had been meaning to save the talking for the training room but the corridor wasn't too busy right now and if he didn't talk then he might be tempted to lash out and he didn't want to do that, he had said he wouldn't do that, and how dare this little s**t claim to care? "Do you just like the reaction? Do you feel powerful when you get under somebody's skin?" It wasn't like he could pretend Izaya hadn't, he had just chased him out of the cafeteria like a Houndoom hunting something small and fluffy with a 'dinner date' in mind.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

"I could ask you the same thing," the black-haired man answered. "Why do you give a damn what I think? You hardly know me. Why does it matter to you so much? If it was Tam-chii or Hayes-san or even Jerry-kun, I might understand. But you got so angry when I asked you if you wanted to come with me on that mission. You didn't even have any proof that I asked for any reason other than what I stated; that I might have needed back-up."

His voice was serious again. "You're sensitive, so why insist on hiding that? It's only making things worse. Do you think you have to be strong for someone? That all of Team Rocket will crumble around you if you crack, like some pillar or foundation? That you can't ask for help because it'll mean you're weak? Or have you convinced yourself that you don't need it?"  

[TawnyAngel]

He wasn't sure he knew the answer to any of that, well the cracking pillar bit was obviously bullshit but the rest....

Aulus headed into the stairwell and down, trying to think but also trying not to think. He didn't want to think about any of it. He wanted it all to just be in the past. He wanted it not to have happened at all. He wanted to at least not be so... so....

He stepped out of the stairwell and from there turned into the first training room, which was mercifully vacant. "In," he snapped, holding the door and fixing Izaya with a glare.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

Still a bit bitter over having been somewhat man-handled and not all that fond of being ordered around, the grunt stuck out his tongue childishly at the red-eyed agent before entering the room.  

[TawnyAngel]

Brat.

Aulus let out a slow breath and counted to ten in his mind, you were meant to do that right?

"I give a damn what you say when you say things you have no Gods damned right to say!"

And there went that relative calm.

To keep himself from making a fist to smash Nakura's face with Aulus folded his arms across his chest and clenched his hands on his biceps. "You don't get to talk about it," he continued in tones are sharp as razors and so, so tightly controlled because he was going to be calm not just scream and confirm what Nakura thought about him. Whatever that was, he didn't even know, but controlled clearly wasn't part of it. "You can play innocent but I know what you meant, you were trying to get a reaction out of me and as if that's not bad enough anyway you did it on a mission. A mission you brainless little skidmark and don't pretend you didn't think I would take the meaning that I did."

Breathe in, breathe out, resist the urge to smash Nakura's face into the wall until blood poured from his nose in a river.

"And my business is my business not anyone else's, that's why; my personal feelings aren't any of anyone's business unless I decide otherwise." Did that sound like a reasonable reason? It was true, or was part of the truth anyway. The greater truth though.... He just didn't want to think about it, was that so very hard to imagine? Why, why, why had he volunteered to take Izaya in his group? He should have fobbed him off on Rory or something.  

[lZAYA ORlHARA]

"Don't I?" Nakura tilted his head as if this was the first he'd heard of not being allowed to talk about something. "Do you have a gag order on me or something?"

"Oi, now, who's the one jumping to assumptions about who?" he countered. "How do you know I wasn't trying to help? Oh, but I couldn't possibly because I'm not your closest best buddy-buddy in the whole world; I'm not your partner obligated to look out for you. I have no idea what you went through, so what gives me the right to try to find out? Concern for another human being? Couldn't be."

"So of course that means I must have been messing with you all this time for nothing more than my own amusement. Tch." He leaned back against a wall. "If that was all it was, I wouldn't even have to try. I could just sit back and watch you go out of your mind trying to keep up that tough act of yours."

Pushing off the wall, he walked right up to the agent until their faces were mere inches apart. "Your personal feelings are everyone's business if it's going to put our team in jeopardy. You know by now you're not always going to have Hayes by your side to confide in, but the 'team' in 'Team Rocket' doesn't only consist of one person. You have to trust your teammates or you have no business being in charge around here as the agent you claim to be."

Crimson eyes glared at red ones. "You don't want to listen to me because I'm a scum-of-the-earth piece of s**t? Fine. Then take it from someone whose lack of trust got a fellow teammate killed, because that could be you, next."  

[TawnyAngel]

Aulus didn't step back. He didn't launch right into a rant either. He didn't do anything in fact other than stare, anger replaced by blankness. He remembered Aila. He remembered that flight back, how she had.... He remembered meeting her before he joined the team, and he remembered persuading her to keep the Spinarak that had adored and stalked her.

"I didn't know you cared about her." The words came out sounding a bit distant and more than a bit confused. So far as he knew Izaya didn't care about anything or anyone but himself. Was he wrong, or was this just a new level of trying to mess with him?

What if Izaya was right?

...Izaya was right, partially; not about it being everyone's business - it was his business and his alone - but.... Maybe he could, should try to trust a bit more. If he was more honest would it help? But if he let people know they wouldn't respect him, they wouldn't want to rely on him. Even if Izaya was just trying to mess with him he had a point though, this was....

"If you were, or are tying to help, you're going a damn fine way about seeming like you're not," Aulus managed eventually, placing a hand on the grunt's chest and pushing gently but firmly backwards. "Get out of my space." He didn't know what to say to the rest, or what to think or... anything really. He didn't know. Why him? Why couldn't it have happened to somebody else? It was a terrible thing to think but he thought it anyway, wished uselessly that he and Alex had got away rather than being captured... Tam and Jerome too, and the others he supposed. Who would he wish it on then? Even the thought of wishing it on Izaya made him feel sick.