[CLOSED] For the first time, we will meet-

[indennizzo]

Characters: Luke fon Fabre & Jade Curtiss [indennizzo & mind_of_the_sky]
Content: After so many years, Jade's past returns to him in the form of a certain Erealian noble...
Setting: Jade's office, the Victoria II.
Time: The day before Amicus, afternoon.
Warnings: Complicated science musings, one confused and frustrated redhead and loads of Jade inner monologue. And uh,

Comments

[mind_of_the_sky]

Jade, comfortably settled on his couch with a few choice medical journals, would later swear he sensed the encroaching doom prior to hearing it. If nothing else, his long years with Peony had attuned him to the pitter-patter of little hooves and their not-so-little pursuers.

He was, then, up and at the door at almost the exact moment a familiar scratching sound began. Calmly, Jade opened the door (the rappig would sit there scratching and whining all day otherwise. Letting the thing in was the lesser of two annoyances) and tried not to sigh as Jade-the-rappig trotted in.

What he'd not expected was the boy that followed, obviously in enraged pursuit. Jade later reasoned that was the only reason the young man had neglected to notice his target waddling through the suddenly-open doorway and subsequently tripped over the rappig and into the floor.

The boy made a somewhat undignified noise as he lunged downward, limbs flailing, while Jade-the-rappig squealed indignantly at the abuse and gallumphed over to its makeshift nest in the corner, obviously shaken. For a long moment, Jade stood where he was, fingers pinched at the bridge of his nose, trying to regain a sense of calm amidst the chaos of two loudly complaining new visitors. He shut the door, gently, and without a word began gathering up basic first aid supplies from the storage closet.

[indennizzo]

Okay, first of all : ow.

Second of all : Ow.

And third of all : OW.

Pain throbbed through his body as Luke contiuned to lie face first onto the ground, his chin hurting from the impact. Eyes screwed tightly shut, the redhead bit on his tongue to prevent him from making any too loud noises of pain as he willed the pain in his body to dissipate. It did, somewhat - the seventh fonons (unknown to Luke of course) in his body worked as they fixed the mild bruises upon him and the pain faded into a manageable throb.

The Erealian muttered a curse as he pushed himself up once that was done with, sitting on the floor as he glanced around to see where he was, finding the place rather unfamiliar. There was a couch, a bed... and the rappig settled down quite comfortably in the corner of the room and-- Luke jerked his head up when he saw a pair of legs from the closet and saw Jade Curtiss for the first time.

...well, not that Luke knew he was Jade, but that would be changed soon, at any rate.

[mind_of_the_sky]

Jade turned out of the supply closet, anapestic and bandages in hand, and smirked a bit at the slowly recovering red-head before him. "Anything broken~?" he asked, growing somewhat more amused.

Such a crash-landing - and the ensuing chaos - had certainly not been in his plan for the afternoon, but Jade knew that peace and quiet were a rare commodity, particularly in the medical bay. Traumatize rappig aside, however, the boy's clumsiness was a welcome and amusing change from the normal bullet wounds and high blood pressure so common on the Victoria II.

[indennizzo]

Luke pushed himself up into a sitting position on the floor, still rubbing at the healing bruise on his chin. He didn't have the best control of his fonon ability - Rin and Delita only taught him a little, but it was more for combat rather than anything else; Rin due to the circumstances they were in, and Deliat simply because they had been sparring. The redhead looked up at the doctor, the hand covering his chin as he gave the man his best scowl and snapped a response. "Of course I'm fine!" The bruise would heal - he certainly didn't need any help.

He then turned his attention to the rappig that was now quite happily huddling in the corner of the room in its self-made (and rather messy) nest of... things, blinking a few times in response. The Erealian wasn't aware that the animal even had a nest other than Peony's room. That sure was strange - Luke was pretty sure he would have remembered if the animal had a nest somewhere else. Not to mention it seemed pretty... at home here. "I didn't know Jade had another nest somewhere else..."

[mind_of_the_sky]

Jade smiled tightly at the boy's snappish reply and walked over towards him nevertheless. "Humor me."

He was distracted from asking the young man to stand up by his next question, and resisted the urge to roll his eyes in the rappig's general direction. "Like his master, my namesake has some rather inconvenient ideas on 'personal space'." That is, the rappig had simply waddled in one day and refused to leave. The silly creature had spent five hours at the infirmary door making rather pitiful sounds - even Takano had commented on the rappig's plight, though Jade suspected she had done so out of amusement rather than concern.

[indennizzo]

The Erealian glowered at the man at that, but complied all the same - it wasn't as if he was being asked to do anything else after all. It was just standing up. So that he did, partially gloved hands (thanks to Peony) against the floor as the teenager pushed himself up from the floor and stumbled a little before straightening himself.

Just as he bent down to brush off the dust on his hands and pants, Luke paused when he heard the doctor's comment about the rappig. His namesake? No way. This guy couldn't be.

"Y-You're Jade?!" came the surprised exclamation from the redhead as he stumbled back a bit and pointed a finger at him. But this... what... it couldn't be... the man before him was really the last image of 'Jade' that Luke had from the many stories he had heard about from Peony. All the Erealian could do was to stare at the doctor and gape like a fish.

What. The. Hell.

[mind_of_the_sky]

Jade narrowed his eyes at the boy, mildly confused and somewhat worried. The surprised pointing and gesturing was, sadly, not uncommon for the good doctor - however, such exclamations referred to him by his professional name, Dr. Balfour, or Dr. Curtiss if the exclaimee was in the military.

The fact that the boy instinctively used his first name could mean only one thing. "His Majesty is as gregarious as usual, I assume." Jade managed not to roll his eyes, but only by closing them for a brief moment. Peony's stories were never good for his public image.

[indennizzo]

"Y-Yeah, well..." the redhead started once again when he had managed to gather back his wits after the initial surprise had faded. Though, he still didn't quite know what to say - sure, he had heard loads of stories about Jade from Peony, but the mental image he had gathered from the royal about the doctor certainly wasn't quite like the man who was before him now.

Luke paused for a while more before his mind clicked with the suitable words, and then the Erealian spoke again. "...I guess Peony really likes to exaggerate things, huh," he murmured as he cast a glance to the side. He should have known better than to trust Peony and his usually over-the-top stories.

[mind_of_the_sky]

"His Majesty adds flair to every retelling." Jade shrugged a bit and smirked sardonically. If anything, Peony's habitual exaggerations gave the young man a predisposed opinion of Jade, and Jade did so love toying with predispositions.

He adjusted his glasses habitually and peered at the boy, mildly curious. "Since you are an acquaintance of His Majesty's, I assume you're Erealian?" Really, it was getting ridiculously how many royals were crawling about the Victoria II.

[indennizzo]

Luke only snorted at those comments in a mixture of mild amusement and annoyance, crossing his arms over his chest and trying to give off his best impression of being wholly unaffected by whatever Jade had said. Or well, whatever the doctor had meant by saying something like that at any rate. It was so hard to understand people from Reial at times, seesh.

He turned back to look at Jade, emerald eyes blinking and looking at the elder as he answered the latter's inquiry. "Yeah, I am. I've known Peony since I was ten. Dunno if I knew him before that though." Mainly because of the fact that he didn't have any memories whatsoever before that kidnapping incident. The lack of those memories could really be... frustrating at times.

[mind_of_the_sky]

Jade raised an eyebrow, half sardonic, half curious. "I would think His Majesty rather hard to forget." To say the least.

[indennizzo]

The redhead shrugged, face set in a nonchalant expression of 'I could care less' practically written clearly upon his face. "I don't have any memories beyond seven years ago," he explained, "Been that way ever since I got kidnapped or something." Or so what he had been told, at any rate - though really, he didn't give much thought about it. It wasn't too much of a big deal that he didn't have any memories of his childhood. "Whatever it was, I don't have any memories beyond that."

[mind_of_the_sky]

Jade raised an eyebrow, this time less in amusement and more in curiosity. The sort of amnesia the boy was describing was, frankly, medically impossible. "That must have been some rather traumatic kidnapping." Still, there was little reason for the young man to lie about severe amnesia - there had to be an explanation somewhere.

[indennizzo]

"Seems like it," Luke agreed off-handedly, shrugging once again. He had come to terms with his loss of memory since a while ago - he wasn't going to let something as trivial as this bring him down. So what if he lacked his memories? They were still in the past regardless; what was more important was his future, and what that future held for him. "Apparently I was gone for quite a while. By the time they found me, I already lost my memory due to the trauma, or so the doctors said anyway." He could really care less what the explanation was - the bottom line was that he had lost his memories one way or another and that was that.

[mind_of_the_sky]

"Might I ask what sort of trauma?" Jade asked. He didn't mean to pry- well, he did mean to pry, but he wanted to go about it in a passably polite way. "If, that is, you remember it." Always the chance he'd have that sort of luck.

It occurred to Jade the boy hadn't introduced himself, beyond behind a friend of Peony's (and really, who wasn't?). "And I don't believe you've told me your name."

[indennizzo]

To that question, again the redhead could only shrug his shoulders in response. "I don't remember. I heard it was the trauma of being kidnapped though. Father has a lot of enemies in Erealia, so..." he trailed off, emerald eyes staring at the air in front of him. Father... again he couldn't help but think just how long it'd been since he had been out from the manor. How were his parents doing? Were they alright? He really hoped they were...

He perked up from his thoughts when Jade spoke up again, and the teenager blinked a few times as he looked at the doctor before the words sunk into his brain. "A-Ah, the name's Luke. Luke fon Fabre."