Crimson

Remember me ?

Vita threw another punch at Nero and the latter grunted loudly .

Nero was more than satisfied , he had done enough .

He removed the elbow pads he had been forced to wear , pushed them into Vita's chest and began to stomp off .

" Hey "...

He did not stop , so , Vita threw one of the elbow pads at his head .

Nero turned in time to catch it before it hit his face .

The two men exchanged frustrated looks , frustration for completely different reasons .

" You promised to hold for me ".

Nero scoffed at Vita's statement .

" I pitied your situation and offered to let you use me as a human punching bag , but this is inhumane , you have been punching me for the past one hour " .

By the time Nero finished his rant , he was yelling .

Vita's shoulder drooped again , it had been the reason Nero had first taken pity on him .

The quarters that had been allotted to them was better than they had expected but since they had been busy since their arrival in Agrippa , they had been unable to check all of the facilities the quarters carried .

They had just discovered the indoor exercise room today but it had been missing a sand bag .

At this point , Nero had offered to wear elbow pads and let Vita punch him , at least to vent his frustration .

Nero had proceeded to regret his great act of kindness for the second half of the year when each of Vita's punch were delivered as if they were meant for a man made out of scrap metal .

" I was not paying attention to my surrounding , I'm sorry Nee " .

Vita's shoulders drooped impossibly lower .

Nero blinked , he was stunned .

Vita , Flavia , Nero and the rest of the seventh brigade had been recruited as children and made to train till they were considered good enough to protect the Royal Crimsons .

During those times , Nero had tried to lengthen Vita's name into Vitalis and Vita had shortened his into Nee .

Unlike , Nero's nickname for Vita , Nee had stuck till they began to go on official Conclave business and Nee had been too childish a name to be used in introductions .

Now , years later , Vita was calling him Nee and apologizing in the same sentence , it was enough to make Nero shed a false tear .

He sighed , a final sigh and moved closer to his friend .

" What exactly did you see beyond the wall ? You have been crazy since that encounter ".

Nero put his fingers on Vita's chin to lift his face up when he did not answer , he still would not reply .

Nero removed his fingers and clapped them together .

" What is the worst thing that you could have seen ? Juno with someone ? "

Vita's head flew up sharply with this .

Nero's eyes widened .

" No way , it's really about Juno ? You saw him with someone else ? Who? "

Vita looked more eager to talk , he used his fingers to ruffle his non-existent hair .

" The owner of The Haze " .

Nero looked more confused .

" Wait ...The Haze has an owner ? "

Vita frowned , he was not even disappointed at this point .

" Of course , it has an owner . Did you think it ran by itself ?"

Nero nodded , he had a thinking expression on .

" That makes sense . But , what does Juno have to do with the owner of the Haze ? "

Vita groaned again .

" Juno says they are friends but they don't look at each other like people that are just friends and anytime I see them , it's either one or the two of them that's naked.... "

Vita stopped talking when he noticed the look that Nero was giving him .

" What ? "

Nero sighed and shook his head .

" You both have seen each other how many times ? Five times now , all coincidental ".

Vita nodded .

" Yes , about five times ".

Nero smiled .

" I know I am no love expert but with the level of interaction you have had with him , do you really have the right to act so possessive of him or be this angry ? "

Vita started the whole drooping shoulders show all over again .

Nero continued regardless .

" Their relationship might seem like more but you have no definitive proof so why won't you take his words seriously ? or did you see something beyond the wall that makes you think they are not just friends ".

Vita coloured , embarrassed at being so easy to read as a brigadier .

But , it was Nero so he could relax .

" His neck had a love bite " .

Vita had never imagined there would be a time when they would be talking about his love problems and not Nero's .

Nero had a strange expression on and he was moistening his lips with his tongue for the second time since he asked his last question .

Vita frowned , " What are you thinking of ? ".

Nero smiled like a cat that was planning on hijacking milk .

" If you are worried about the owner of The Haze ,that must mean he's pretty decent to look at .

I am thinking of the fact that they did it so close to me , I might not be interested in Juno but I am not blind to how he looks , especially how he looked yesterday with the shimmers ".

Vita closed his fist and stepped towards his former friend and partner .

Nero gulped and rushed to salvage what was left of the conversation .

" What I meant is that with the way he looks , you don't expect everyone to have been blind to his looks before you arrived , even the owner of The Haze ".

Vita understood and realized it was the truth , everyone could not have been blind to Juno's looks and the silks he wore had given him away .

Vita had checked and Juno did not belong to any of the upperclass families that might have been able to afford silk on a daily basis which has sealed his suspicion that Juno and Ali were not just friends .

He looked back at Nero who had been watching him closely , all this time .

" A love bite does not prove that there's something between them ".

Vita stated firmly .

Nero chuckled .

" Well , it proves something . A love bite does not just appear , there should have at least been some kissing " .

Vita watched Nero closely as every word came out .

Nero was right , but something about that sounded odd .

He tried to think of what , but he could not seem to determine what was causing the unease .

Was it the thought of Juno kissing ?

As If prompted , an image came to him .

It was of Juno standing still as an unknown man held unto him and kissed his neck , the image was oddly blurry .

Just as he began to wonder where this image had stemmed from , Juno pushed the man off him and he landed on his ass .

He looked a lot like ,wait...

It came back then , the second drink .

Running through the crowd , feeling queasy , losing consciousness , thinking he was dreaming of Juno and kissing him and then telling him of the dreams he had about him .

He turned to Nero then .

Nero had been waiting for a while now , for Vita to tell him what he had been thinking of when his face had looked like a whirlwind of emotions .

" I remember everything now ."

Vita started to moan pitifully as he began to hit his head with the elbow pad .

Nero had tried very hard to be impatient and wait till Vita was ready but , he was losing it .

" What is it you remember ?"

Vita paused his self prescribed purgatory to look at Nero .

" I was the one . I gave him a love bite when I was drunk ".

Nero was shocked .

Frigid Vita had done what ?

" I might have also told him that I dream about f*****g him ".

Vita was struck dumb .

Goddesses , Juno had given Vita some vixen blood .

He looked back at Vita .

" Wait , so , instead of apologizing , you stormed off like he had offended you ? "

Vita nodded slowly .

Now , he understood the confused look Juno had .

He was immensely embarrassed , he had wanted to prove to Juno that he was better than Ali but not only had he failed , now , Ali would laugh at him forever .

Nero whistled .

" You pretty much f****d up your chance to score ".

Vita glared at him .

" I don't want to score with him ".

Nero did not reply him , he just winked and proceeded to shake his eyebrows like a mad man.

Nero was right though , he had f****d up .