Shakugan No Hybrids: Chapter 9

Chapter 9 Feelings Easily Read

The hybrid is weakened, but he studies Shana’s expression carefully as he voices his request.
Shana glares at him, ready to beat him up the second he tries to pull something off.
“I don’t know where it is” she says to him, coldly.
“You are a bad liar flamehaze.”
Malachite sits down in a corner, holding his wounded hands protective against his chest.
While the scars no longer glow, it is clear the pain hasn’t faded yet.
“I think we both know who is in possession of Friagne's ring.
And the fact I am negotiating with you instead of simply going there and retrieving it shows I am very..polite.”
“The second he comes near Yuji I will slice him into a million tiny pieces!” she thinks.
“I don't know where it is! Yuji has it and I don't know where he is!”
“Why do you give the torch a name?
It is just an object.”
Malachite looks slightly confused.
He really doesn’t understand it.
Shana remembers that she felt the same way considering torches before she met Yuji.
That seems ages ago now..
“And the object is probably waiting for you for its weekly training session” the hybrid continues talking.
“Oh yes, I watched you two, I always observe future possibilities.
It was highly..entertaining.”
Shana widens her eyes in surprise, and Malachite smirks as he notices it.
“How many times did he watch?”  Shana wonders.
“Even without being able to sense his existence, I should have noticed something!
Is it something new…some form of stealth spell perhaps?”
As she manages her thoughts her face becomes almost as void of any feelings as Malachite’s.
“He's not...only a torch! He is Yuji Sakai.”
“He is just a remnant.
The real Yuji Sakai was Friagne's dinner at a certain point” Malachite argues.
“It doesn't matter! He is Yuji Sakai!” Shana insists.
“Whatever you say fireball.”
The half denizen’s face shows a flash of pain for a split second while saying that.
“He is acting all tough, but he isn’t in any condition to make demands.. it’s a big bluff!” she realizes.
She sighs.
“Right now I don't know where Yuji is. I can't find the Azur.”
The hybrid looks puzzled.
“Can't..
Or don't want to?”
“I don't know where he is!” Shana repeats stubbornly.
“Then I suppose I will just have to go and find him myself.
Today really is a busy day..”
“Stay away from him!” she spats.
“Afraid I will eat your toy flamehaze?”
It is clear that Malachite enjoys to get on her nerves.
She growls.
“If you dare as much as to touch even  a single hair of his I swear I will cut you in pieces!”
Shana feels angry, her eyes become fiery red again, and she gazes upon the hybrid with a mixture of rage and the fact that she will protect Yuji whatever the cost.
HA! Malachite shouts.
Shana is surprised by this sudden sound, and is not sure what to think of it.
“This cannot be!
A flamehaze in love..
No even better!
A flamehaze in love..with a torch?!
How amusing!”
It is clear that he considers it to be one of the best jokes he has heard for a long time.
Shana feels frustrated that she gave away how she feels that easily..
And is also slightly disturbed by the fact he could so easily read it from her face.
If he can..who else has seen the same feelings?
“Shut up!”  Shana yells at him, only making things worse.
“So tell me” Malachite says as he leans forward from his corner of the room.
It is a pose as if one would talk to a child, very humiliating.
“ Does the torch want to hold hands with you?” he says with a devilish grin while using a childish tone in his voice.
“Shut up shut up shut up!”
Embarrassed Shana jumps across the room, draws the Nietono no Shana, and holds it close to his face.
It is a threat, as if she is about to cut him.. yet she does no such thing when she realizes she got tricked into doing so..exactly as Malachite expected her to do.
Her faces becomes red.
“You have no idea what me and Yuji share! You don't know him! You know nothing!”
As she says that Malachite’s  face becomes a mask without expression.
“I know more of such matters then you think flamehaze.
Don't ever doubt that again.
ever.”
Shana is not sure what just happened, but somehow she feels she struck a weak spot.
But she has no idea what weak spot it was she just uncovered, and how she triggered it in the first place!
All she does is glare at him.
The hybrid lays one finger on the blade of Nietono no Shana and pushes it aside a bit.
“Would you mind pointing that thing somewhere else?
It makes me nervous.”
“Kh!”  Shana hisses aggravated.
But in the end she lowers her sword.
“Good girl.
So you actually DO obey to certain commands.”
“Shut up!”  she yells at him as she raises her sword again.
Her eyes look just as furious as she feels.
“I would never take commands from you!”
“And just when I thought we were making progress.. “ Malachite says with a dramatic voice.
“Shut up!”
“Tssk..
You flamehaze are so boring with your limited dialogue options..
I need a drink.”
He more or less stands up, and limps towards a small cabinet in the corner of the room.
Shana doesn’t move but her eyes track his motions.
As Malachite opens the cabinet she can see all sorts of bottles , and all of them alcoholic. They have one common trait: None of them are cheap in either price or quality.
“Margery would probably be thrilled if she saw this” Shana thinks.
“You should take some action.
I'm surprised if the poor object even has the slightest idea how you think about him.”
He seems to be more serious this time, as he pours himself what appears to be a pretty expensive whiskey of some sort.
“That's because...”
Shana stops.
“Because I haven’t told him yet” she thinks.
She realizes how stupid it is of her to keep postphoning that moment.
“But what if Yuji doesn’t like me as much as I like him? “she thinks.
“Perhaps he likes Kazumi…Yoshida san…more..
I must confess to him before Yoshida Kazumi does!
But..its hard..”
“From the looks of things I’d say that you haven’t told him about your feelings yet” Malachite says, once again very accurately reading the feelings from her face.
“You are almost cute in your innocence hunter.
But in matters of the heart, the good things rarely come to those who wait.”
He is sitting down in the corner again, his legs crossed below him while taking a sip from his drink with his eyes closed.
“He sounds..nice and  his advice seems..genuine..”Shana thinks.
“But no, he must be fooling around somehow, he attacked me not so long ago!
Nobody shifts around his mood that quick!”
She glares at him, searching for any sign indicating he is just trying to get on her nerves again, but she can’t find any.
The fact that it was an honest advice confuses her.
“Don't give me that look.”  The hybrid says, misinterpreting her gaze.
“Grown-ups drink hunter.
You should try it sometime.
Ow wait, flamehazes don't grow older anymore after making a contract.”
He holds his glass against the light, looking at it with a bit of a dreamy expression on his face.
“Pity, pity..” he mumbles.
“So.. you do not interpret everything right..” she thinks satisfied.
“I don't need that!” she says, pointing at his glass.
She thinks of Margery, and how she would be all worn-out after drinking too much.
“Flamehazes don't really need much food or drink...of course there are exceptions...” Alastor suddenly enters the conversation.
“Who says I need it?” Malachite reacts.
“But I want it” he says as he puts his glass down on the floor.
“I suppose that is something I like about the denizen part of the family.
At least they acknowledge desires.
We even have a God just for that you know.
Living your life to the fullest to fullfill your desires..
There are worse ways of living..”
He empties his glass in a single go, consuming an amount of alcohol a human would probably need several hours to drink in a responsible way.
“True. A Crimson Lord like myself wouldn't understand such way of living, since we have no such thing as "human desires". So I can't exactly approve nor disapprove the way a person decides to live.” Alastor responds neutrally.
“Yet denizens have desires and wishes, and you are of the same race.
In a way we are distant family”  Malachite says, and he laughs his joyless laugh.
“Don't you have desires God of Judgement..or do you simply ignore their existance?” he asks Alastor.
“Are you afraid to cross a line perhaps?
And if so, that means you can be corrupted..
Now that is an interesting concept..”
Shana frowns as she listens to this peculiar conversation.
Alastor rarely speaks to strangers, and even more rarely for such an extended amount of time.
The last time he spoke so much to someone unknown was when she bound his pendant to her cellphone so he could speak with Chigusa san..
“Hmm...What you humans or Denizens call "desires" …for us it is not something that important. However even when we don't have such needs we still don't lack of feelings...
Some of us are really attached to their Contactors”, the flame of heaven ignores the hybrids insinuation.
“Am I spotting a love triangle here?” Malachite suddenly exclaims slightly intrigued.
“My my little girl, do you have the luxury of picking?” he says as he looks at Shana.
“The all-powerful crimson lord or the tiny torch?
Wars have been started for less you know.”
“Shut up shut up shut up!” she utters in a reflex, feeling very uncomfortable.
“My relationship with Shana has nothing to do with such kind of relationship. As  my Contractor, the Flaming Haired Blazing Eyed Hunter, was destined to die when she received my flames.”
“ahhh.. Tenpa Jōsai….” Malachite understands.
“So the rumors are true. Yet, you are still here, and not dead. I suppose that is a good thing.
But I suppose you refer to your first contractor.
I guess I will take your word for it.. if you say so necklace.
I wasn't around back then.
My existance came in a later era.”
“Hmm...” Alastor ponders.
“Well, at least that means he is not an ancient existence”  Shana thinks.
“But I have no idea when he DID come into this world..”
“You shouldn't drink that much! “ she says coldly.
“Hmpf “  Malachite sounds amused.
“Maybe I shouldn't.”
Shana looks at his hands as he pours himself another glass.
Elegant hands with long fingers, covered with that massive amount of small black lines.
Really strange scars...She wonders where he got them.
She remembers his panick and pain when she grabbed them to put bandages around them to heal the cuts she made with Nietono no Shana earlier.
“But,” the hybrid continues, interrupting her thoughts, “ even if I shouldn't, I want to.
There is not much else to do for me at this point.
I cannot search for Azur for as long as you are here, and I am not sensing any Rinne around.
Thus,
cheers.”
And with that said, he lifts his glass towards her in a mocking gesture.