When blossoms fade

[hellsingsforyou]

Khamja were having a crisis meeting.

They didn't meet often. The disparate interests of a group like Khamja meant that the individual members didn't like being stuck together very much. It led to tension, and tension, in Khamja, led to people mysteriously disappearing. Not everyone knew everyone else in Khamja, and they usually liked to keep it that way, but something like this was unavoidable.

It had also created an opening for Lucis to expand its interests. Integra had no investment in Lucis; her interests lay in Athlum, but Lucis was tentatively an ally of Athlum, and more importantly, an enemy of Niflheim, and Integra was fond of the adage that the enemy of your enemy is your friend. At least for now.

The Lucian member was sending a representative. Integra had agreed to vouch for him because she knew him through other channels. That the young man in question was the nephew of a personal friend of Integra's went a long way towards her agreement. She could confirm his identity, and his origin in the absence of the Lucian member himself.

Underlings were allowed to accompany members on the journey, which was fortunate because Integra wasn't walking into the rat's nest that was a Khamja meeting without Alucard. Nor would the journey through the dry, sandy, and monster infested Zertinan Caverns have been so easy.

Alucard was brutal, but rarely efficient. He enjoyed the work too much to keep things neat. Integra walked, and Alucard cleared the path. It was a long walk, but Integra knew better than to complain because she wasn't foolish enough to show weakness in front of Alucard.

As she made her way past the mangled corpse of an Archeoaevis, its head nearly torn all the way off, she pulled a cigar from her breast pocket and lit it with a match. "Try not to leave a trail," she warned.

The path narrowed considerably in places, and sandfalls disguised other parts of the route, but eventually they came upon a door, barely visible in the rock, and magically bound. Integra pressed a gloved hand to it, and a glyph formed, followed by the sound of rock sliding against stone.

There was another chamber beyond, and multiple routes into it, but Integra ignored those in favour of the next door. The chamber reeked of potent magic, this fell within the sphere of some powerful wards.

The next door also opened at a touch, leading them into a bottleneck. Alucard walked on ahead, like any good guard dog would, and Integra followed as the final door opened to reveal a grand entrance hall.

"Mind your manners," she said, glancing sidelong at Alucard, "and no fighting unless I tell you." Not that Alucard needed the warning; he knew the rules. Integra wasn't concerned about his safety, or her own; she was more concerned with the tedious reparations that would have to be made if Alucard killed someone's prized underling.

"Don't I always?" Alucard asked, with that knowing look and flash of fang that said he knew the answer all too well.

Integra ignored him.

Comments

[thesilentstorm]

"Mmn," Lumi said, half listening to the Noah plan to try and get rid of his Zanpakutō. He wasn't worried. He'd kill them before they got close.

He leaned on the counter, turning towards the middle of the room and taking away Alucard's position advantage. He folded his arms and looked at Sir Integra once again as he waited for the kettle to boil.

"It is an interesting model to refer to, at least," Lumi said, lifting the tone of his sentence towards the end to make it sound almost like a question.

He doubted the Jyllandis were personally invested in the fate of Aizen, but seeing what could happen when a famous member of a particular country's society got arrested under false or dubious reasoning could provide them with a reference should anything happen closer to home.

"There don't seem to have been any non-residential Ivalicians arrive yet," he said, giving her a little information on the subject. He didn't have any chocobos in that race, so he didn't see why it would be an issue. "They may come at the last minute due to proximity, of course."

[hellsingsforyou]

Integra gave Lumi another smirk. "It'd be wise of them, if they did," she said. "The clan makes no move to intervene in rivalries between members."

Which explained the presence of the Noah and herself in the same building without someone already being dead. A tentative embargo was put in place to stop members fighting during a meeting, but it as more of a heavy suggestion that bloodshed would be met with disapproval than any real sense of impending consequences.

They were all adults, after all, well, for the most part. If they wanted to play with knives, they knew the consequences.

"This place will feel very crowded when the meeting happens," she said. It already did, to her, sharing air with Noah, of all things.

[lesstravelled]

Road grinned widely. "Well, we could always draw out the local squad," she said.

Dalmasca was Captain Ichimaru's jurisdiction, and Gin was one of the clan members, she knew that for certain. Maybe he could volunteer someone.

Or maybe they could hunt one down. Ivalice wasn't used to having people like them around that could control an Akuma, or a Hollow. It wouldn't be hard to trick some idiot into walking into a trap of them.

[hellsingsforyou]

Alucard watched Lumi with a critical eye, but he listened to the Noah with a much more critical ear.

So they thought they could kill this one, did they? Lumi was, at least in Alucard's view, an Exorcist until proven otherwise. He wasn't intimidated by Alucard, either, which meant he was strong, at least strong enough that he didn't get initimidated.

If he was someone else's bodyguard, maybe he wasn't so dissimilar from Alucard, really. Now wouldn't that be interesting?

He wasn't stupid either. He didn't let Alucard stay lingering behind him, and Alucard moved to stay near Integra, without Lumi being between them.

[intangibleman]

"Might be too obvious," Tyki said, giving a shrug of his shoulders.

He pulled out the metal case from his inside jacket pocket and took another pre-rolled cigarette out of it. He tapped it a couple of times against the case's shell and put one end between his lips.

"Us here, that happening? Might be better to go further afield."

He lit that cigarette with another match and flicked it away, inhaling his first lungful of smoke.

[thesilentstorm]

"Indeed. Nobody expects the truce to hold," he said, expecting very much that there would be at least one squabble between members, if not subordinates, before the meeting was over. He suspected that Hojo would be at the centre of it too, revolting man that he was.

He glanced at the kettle, listening to it bubble and waiting for the click.

"It already feels rather crowded," he said, lightly.

More than usual, anyway. Well, Kuja and Gin weren't permanent residents, but they came and went often enough that their presences were background noise even when they were there. The strangers made it feel more crowded, though. While the little cadre of Arrancar troublemakers were gone, Kreeth, the Noah, these two and the Lucian emissaries had taken their place.

When that lot came back... crowded wouldn't be the word.

[hellsingsforyou]

Integra threw a brief look in the direction of the Noah. "On that, we agree," she said, not bothering to hide her distaste. Lumi would have caught it anyway if he'd paid attention to the tones and body language even though he didn't speak Jyllandi. "But meetings like this are an opportunity to make new contacts, for better or worse."

For the worse would be the Noah. She was wholly confident that Alucard could take one of them down, but two would be more of a challenge, especially when she wasn't sure of the second one's identity yet.

For the better may just prove to be Lumi.

[lesstravelled]

"It could be fun," Road replied, grinning at Tyki, and roughly two inches away from telling him not to be boring. Tyki wasn't boring, he was her favourite to go out and work with because Tyki was Tyki. She could relax around him, and he enjoyed what he did, and she enjoyed it too.

"Maybe we can leave some goodbye presents," she suggested.

A few dead Gotei members as they left would be a nice goodbye to the Gotei squads.

[intangibleman]

"Yes," he grinned, his white teeth glinting behind the smoke. "Dalmasca's all desert though, let's find somewhere that doesn't look like the back end of Lucis to deliver them."

[thesilentstorm]

"Indeed they are," Lumi replied, picking the kettle up after it clicked of the boil.

He poured it into his mug, the instant granules in the bottom swirling with the water to make an astringent-smelling blackish liquid rise to the brim. He turned away briefly to add sugar to the unpleasant brew and then picked the cup up by the handle.

"I daresay you'll meet my partner at some point over the next few days," he said, inclining his head to her slightly and turning to walk to the door. He didn't resist giving Alucard a lingering, warning look. "I have work to be doing on my ship, so I shall take my leave."

He moved noiselessly through the kitchen and stopped at the door.

"One of the subordinate members of the Clan usually shows visiting members to their rooms," he said, looking very much at Integra and not Alucard. "She will likely be along soon. In the event that she isn't, the rooms upstairs that have their doors open are vacant. We have been instructed to close and lock the doors of the occupied ones to make the distinction clear."