Chapter 5 ~~~

A crash resonated from throughout the entire room. Tieria remained lifeless in the desk chair. Another crashing noise was made. "Haro I don't think that's going to work." More crashes. "I think you broke a glass this time." Haro was bouncing around the room as he had been for the past five minutes. "Ok, how is the kid not awake yet? I don't think anyone could sleep through this!" Lockon panicked.

Haro was hitting walls, the ceiling, the floor, the bed, the desk, and practically anything in the room. "Haro I think you should be a little more careful where you bounce off from." Lockon said. Attempting to pick up a fallen book from the floor, he retreated back to his bed with a headache.

More of a mess was made. The entire room looked like chaos and Haro wasn't helping with that fact. He bounced of the door to the room and into Tieria's head. He awoke with a splitting cry. Tieria tried to clutch his head to stop the searing pain in his head. "Lockon's awake! Lockon's awake!" Haro continued to ricochet off of surfaces.

Lockon laughed despite his own headache. "I think he already figured that out buddy." He was laying on his bed. The wet cloth that Tieria had put on his forehead earlier was left on the bedside table.

"Couldn't you have woken me up some other way." He leaned back into the chair and shut his eyes. "What time is it Haro?"

"2 o'clock! 2 o'clock!" Haro ceased his bouncing.

"I've been asleep for three hours?" His eyes opened and was met with the messy room, and Lockon. "What happened here?! It looks like a tornado came through here" He practically yelled.

"Haro did it! Haro did it!"

"What could've possibly caused you to do it?"

"You weren't waking up." Lockon piped up. "I would've waken you if I could get out of bed. Then Haro decided to bounce off of every surface in hopes of making a loud enough noise."

"Y-your awake now." Tieria stuttered, looking at his fellow Meister. He had been unaware of Lockon being awake as he had been lying on his bed.

"Good afternoon to you too, Tieria."

Uncertain of what to say, Tieria got up and grabbed the rag on Lockon's bedside table, refusing to look Lockon in the eye "U-um, I'm going to, wet this rag. B-be right b-back." With that he left the room.

Lockon was left feeling confused. Why had Tieria been blushing? And was he stuttering? Tieria of all people, stuttering and blushing? "Haro what happened with Tieria?"

"You did! You did?"

That didn't help Lockon. He had done something, he could've already figured that out. But what did he do? Trying to recollect his memories, he was faced with yet another headache.

"Ask Christina! Ask Christina!"

Lockon hit the call button and quickly chatted with Christina, calling her to his room. What does Christina have to do with Tieria? What does she know?

Christina quickly rushed to his room, uncertain of the circumstances. "What do you need me for?" She asked, poking her head through the door. She stared wide eyed at the mess that was in front of her. She hadn't been doing anything productive at the moment. Anything is better than sitting around looking at a screen all day on the bridge. "Where's Tieria? I thought he was in here?"

"He went to go wet a rag with cold water."

"Ok, that's good. What do you need me to do?"

"Tieria was acting weird just a few minutes ago. When I tried asking Haro what happened to him, he said I did something. Then he said to ask you what I did, for some reason. What did I do?"

Christina went red in the face. How was she supposed to answer his questions? She barely knew half of what's going on with the two of them. "Well, I don't know all of it," She started, trying to remember their conversation at breakfast. "you came in during breakfast and wrapped yourself around Tieria." Lockon looked back at her questioningly. "You started to whisper stuff into his ear. I could only hear parts of what you were saying, but the conversation was short as Tieria had noticed you had a fever. Speaking of which, Dr. Moreno should be coming around midday tomorrow to check on you."

His memories were starting to come back to him. How he acted last night, that morning, and even at breakfast. His face was bright red in embarrassment. He could barely believe that he acted like that. "T-thank you Christina. Sorry to b-bother you."

She laughed. "It's fine. I'll be heading back to the bridge. Call if you need anymore help." She left the room as Tieria came inside.

"Why was Christina h-here?"

The wet cloth was set onto his forehead. Tieria looked away from Lockon while doing so. "Sh-she was just answering some questions of mine."

"Ah, I-I see." He said, looking down at the floor. "That's good, is there anything else you need?"

"N-no, I'm f-fine right now."

"If y-you need anything, just press the call button and I-I'll be here."

Tieria was leaving the room when Lockon spoke up. "Wait!" He called towards him. Tieria turned around in confusion. "Can you stay with me?" He asked. It was funny. It was almost as if the previous nights roles were flipped and he was the one that needed consoling.

"I-I suppose I can. I should cl-clean up this mess as well." He used his index and middle finger to push up the rim of his glasses that rest on the bridge of his nose and picked up a book that lay on the ground, placing it on Lockon's desk. The atmosphere was tense and awkward. The air could've been cut with a butter knife. Not even Haro spoke up.

Lockon couldn't find the words to say nor the courage to speak to the man that was nice enough to clean the mess that his best friend made, even if Haro could clean the mess himself. He was just too nice that way. He didn't even know why he had asked Tieria to stay. Boredom maybe? There wasn't much to in his sick state. Someone other than Haro to talk with would be a nice change.

Words refused to form in his mouth, like he didn't know how to talk in that moment. Tieria seemed to notice his struggle. "I-Is there a p-problem, Lockon?"

"I-I…" Tieria looked at him confused. "I'msorryaboutlastnightandhowIacted!" The words spilled from his mouth, not knowing what else to say. His eyes were squeezed shut, a blush from embarrassment. Just digger a deeper grave.

Tieria was stunned. He couldn't decipher the full sentence, only bits and pieces. "I'm sorry c-can you repeat that?"

His eyes opened slightly. Tieria seemed just as flushed as he was. Good to know he wasn't the only one embarrassed. It was the spur of the moment that caused him to apologize to the man. There was nothing else he could've said. What better moment to apologize for his actions than now? Better soon than later.

"I-I…" Even if he was to apologize, there was still the embarrassment of his actions. And just why is his heart beating so hard. It seemed as loud as a drum, or was it just him that could hear it? "I'm sorry about how I acted last night. I acted out of line without your permission."

"I wasn't sure if you had a high fever high last night. I could've prevented all this and had you well rested." They each avoided each others gazes, one or the other would look at each other from time to time. When they meet each other's eyes, they would blush a scarlet color and look away frantically. "I don't blame you entirely. It was probably the fever that made you act like that."

A nervous laughter erupted from Lockon's mouth. He couldn't decipher if it was the fever that made him act the way he did. Heck, he couldn't even remember if he had a fever last night? "...Yeah…" He scratched his face, unsure of anything he was going or did.

"It's fine, I won't make a big deal about it. You shouldn't either, you should get your rest." Tieria sat down on the edge of his bed, a hand rested on his leg. His smile was sweet, like candy. His actions genuinely caught Lockon off guard. Tieria stood up and headed for the door. "I'm sorry I have to leave right now. I have to go over a mission plan with Miss Sumeragi." He turned around and bowed to Lockon. "I'll be back later when I'm done."

Lockon was left in shock at how happy Tieria seemed. Was he happy about the mission plan? Getting out of the room? Away from him? The fact that he didn't have feelings for him? What could make someone so happy? His smile lit up the entire room. It was Lockon's turn to hide under the covers of his bed from embarrassment.

'Why am I smiling so brightly? Why won't it stop? What is this warm feeling in my chest? ' Tieria thought as he glided down the hallways of the Ptolemaios to the bridge. 'He may not even have feelings for me, so why am I acting this way?'

"Oh, Tieria, what brings you down here?" Miss Sumeragi greeted him as she got out of her seat. Without saying a word, he dug out a flash drive from the bottom of his pocket and handed it over to Miss Sumeragi. "What's this?"

"It's a mission plan I would like you to approve." He turned around to leave. "And before you look it's contents, I would like you to know that I have been given permission from Allelujah as well."

It was not the same flash drive that had all of the past information on it. He simply got a new flash drive and downloaded the required information needed for the mission plan. It was filled with a detailed 3D version of the institute, along with a debrief on their location and lines of defense. Of course that was unnecessary as it was barely armed, which will be an advantage since he will have to provide backup for Allelujah. He's done it once before, doing it again won't be any problem for Tieria.

There's still the problem with Lockon being sick. Was he sick in the past and we didn't know about it? Is he pushing himself too hard? When did the fever start? If it didn't happen, does that mean that the world is changing? Had his existence and prior knowledge of the world cause this? Would that mean that everything won't repeat itself? Even the thought of that made Tieria feel sick. He was sent back in time to prevent a series of events from happening, and now, he won't even know what will happen? What is the use of knowing every little thing if fate has other ideas?

Would this new fate be just as cruel? There was always a possibility of him dying, though not really. He could always just create a new body to store his consciousness if this one dies. Everyone else aboard the Ptolemaios, are humans and will die as such. Once dead, there's no return.

Tieria will just have to play the safe game, this time round. No one will die on his watch. No matter how many times he has to risk his life in battle, everyone will make it out alive and unscaved.


A/N

Merry Christmas! (Or whatever you celebrate). Here's a present. I have no excuses as to why I always update late except for my procrastination. I promised to update in less than four months and here we are 6 months later. I'm a crappy writer. It's been so long. I didn't even beta read it so I have no idea what even is going on (I pre-wrote the prologue-chapter 6 a while ago and I just copy and paste them). Sorry if it's bad. Please tell me if it is. I'm not going to say the next time I update this, we've all seen how that goes. I'll try and update on New Years, no promises.