Abridged Ties (Gilbert x OC)

Khoyor Dakhi

"So, do you remember anything yet, Nanalie?" Break asked, sifting through a number of old, thick books on a wooden shelf.  He had dragged her off to who-knows-where in the Vessalius mansion and locked her inside of a room.  Thus, she didn't listen to a word he had said and sat on the couch with a prominent pout.

"Nope." She huffed, irritated with the white-haired man's abduction.

"Oh, stop pouting." He complained. "Do you hate being away from Raven that much?" He rolled his single red eye.

"No!" She defended much too quickly.  "I just... It's rude to abduct people!"  In that moment, Break fell to the floor in a fit of laughter.  Thus, he rightfully earned a pillow being thrown in his face.

~+-+-+-+~

"You can't tell her any of this." Gilbert instructed in a threatening tone.

Sharon narrowed her caramel-colored eyes.  "You haven't told her anything?"

He shook his head.  "She hasn't even really looked at the notebooks and I just remembered all of this last night."

"Why the hell haven't you told her?!" Oz yelled.

"You're treating her like a freaking baby." Alice grumbled even though she seemed disinterested with the conversation.

"I'm not." Gilbert retorted with a frustrated golden glare.  "I just want to tell her when I feel it's safe for her to know..." He trailed, even questioning his own mindset.

"When it's 'safe?'" Sharon began to raise her typically sweet voice.  "The poor girl woke up not remembering a single thing about herself.  She's confused and lost! You can't honestly keep something this important about her past from her!  Not only are you treating her as though she were a child, but you're disregarding her situation!" She scolded.

"If you think I'm being inconsiderate, you are wrong." Gilbert tried to assure.  "My job right now is to protect her.  I will not fail this time."

Sharon opened her mouth to disagree with the man, but she was abruptly interrupted when Oz stood.  His emerald green eyes were shielded behind the dark shadows of his bangs as he spoke in a low voice.  "You're wrong about this one, Gil..."  He gritted his teeth angrily.  "There's a huge difference between protecting her and not telling her anything!" He yelled and left the room.

After Oz's leave, Gilbert prepared to storm out of the room himself, but Sharon's voice stopped him from doing so.  "We're not going to tell her.  But we do think that you should tell her as soon as possible."

With an irritable click of his tongue, Gilbert headed to the grand stairwell of the mansion to search for Nanalie.  After about fifteen minutes of searching, he finally burst through the door that held her captive.

Nanalie's surprise was evident when she realized her companion's angry demeanor.  He grasped onto her wrist tightly, roughly pulling her down the stairs and to the main entrance of the Vessalius manor. She kept asking questions along the lines of 'what's wrong?' or 'what's going on?'

When they finally got back to the main hall, he answered.  "We're leaving."

"But, why? What happened?"

Again, Gilbert didn't respond.  Thus, the two of them returned to his apartment in complete, uncomfortable silence.  And for the following few hours, the dark-haired man seemed so wrapped within his thoughts that Nanalie avoided speaking with him.

Later in the afternoon, Gilbert searched though his cabinets to find hardly anything to eat.  "I'm going to go buy some food.  I'll be back soon." He announced monotonously.