Fabricator v2 - Chapter 11

Mittelt clicked her tongue in annoyance and left the master bedroom of Junichiro's home. It only took her a few moments to make her way to the dining room where Azazel himself sat at a table doing paperwork. Despite being an expert at dodging paperwork and responsibility, Azazel was still often caught, cornered, and blackmailed into doing his job by Shemhazai.

As she stepped into the room, he didn't bother looking up as he addressed her, “How is he?”

Mittelt scoffed, “How do you think he is? He's not just a weak human, he's a weak human child. He took one look at his missing limb and fainted.”

When she spoke, Mittelt's tone indicated she was just relating the facts as she saw them. Base humans, objectively, were weaker than even the weakest of Angels and Fallen Angels. This was a biological fact that couldn't be denied. Sacred Gear wielders ran the gamut of 'just slightly better than human, but still weak' to 'OMFG RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!' though they didn't count in this instance.

“I can't believe the people setting up this place missed the stray devil.” She looked at Azazel with her blue eyes narrowed, “I can't believe you missed the stray. In fact, I'm certain you didn't.”

Azazel nodded while he continued to do his work, “Why do you think I chose Kuoh for his house? I could literally put him up anywhere in the world to do his thing, though obviously Japan is the best choice given his limited language options. Still, that gives me all of Japan and it's easily within my means to get him a home anywhere. Even with no overseer Kuoh is still, technically, Devil territory. I believe that's why Lillian was hiding out here, no one from any faction makes their home here making it relatively safe from the supernatural factions, at the moment.”

Mittelt nodded along, “So, you wanted him to run into that freak Lillian and... what? Get mauled? Die? You'd have been better off just murdering him yourself if that was the case. So, what was your plan?”

Azazel finally looked up from his work to stare Mittelt in the eyes, “I did want the kid to run into the stray, I just didn't expect it to happen so soon. I figured he'd lock himself inside of his workshop for a week or two just to play with all of his new toys. Or maybe a week in the shop and another in the library. Except I made one miscalculation.”

Seeing Mittelt's eyebrow rise in question, he sighed and hung his head in mock shame, “I forgot to order the kitchen to be full stocked. I haven't even thought about cooking food for a few centuries.”

As the leader of the Grigori, Azazel simply didn't have time to do minor things like make his own food, or clean up after himself, or anything that didn't involve his research into Sacred Gears and trying to make his own. Even the paperwork necessary for the running of the Grigori had to be forced on him by Shemhazai. He'd just told his minions to furnish the house and did the workshop himself. The kid was lucky that the majority of the house had proper furniture!

Mittelt let out a put upon sigh, “So the kid had to go out to get food and that's why he's been mauled by a stray not even twenty-four hours after moving into this place? You know this is going to destroy his trust in you and make you look incompetent, right?”

Azazel waved his hand in a dismissive manner, “Nah. I've got minions I can throw under the bus. After all, as the Governor General, why would I be directly involved in setting this place up?”

Mittelt scoffed but dropped the subject, “Why did you want him to have the run in with the stray?”

Azazel gave Mittelt a very hard look that put her on edge. He let the silence build for a moment before speaking very seriously, “This falls under the same provisions you agreed to when taking this job.” He only continued after Mittelt nodded in understanding, “There's something off about that kid.”

He set down his writing implement and crossed his arms over his chest, “I looked into his background as much as I could. There's not much to find. Arai Junichiro was born to Arai Sansa, deceased. When she was alive, Sansa was under suspicion of being a prostitute, though she was never caught or convicted. Junichiro's father is unknown but is definitely a regular human, or a weak mage at the very most. So, how is it that he not only unlocked his own mana but also discovered brand new ways to forge mana into mundane metal? How does he know the things he knows and have such confidence in knowledge that seems to come from nowhere?”

Mittelt shrugged her shoulders, “Sacred Gear of some type?”

Azazel nodded, “Exactly my thoughts. Of course, I've never heard of such a Sacred Gear that gives the owner knowledge without manifesting. Not to mention that any Sacred Gear that can communicate with its owner has a living soul locked inside of it, like Albion inside of Divine Dividing. If he had a Sacred Gear in that class, I'd be able to sense it while standing right in front of him. Not to mention all the sensors back at base. But there's nothing. So, either it's an extremely weak model, or he hasn't got one.”

Mittelt's eyes widened, “You wanted him to encounter that stray to see if he would awaken a Sacred Gear!”

Azazel grinned brightly, “Exactly! If he had one, the encounter with her should have drawn it out into the open. The fact that he didn't have one was proven when he didn't subconsciously call on it. Which begs the question, where does he get his knowledge from? How did he learn to do what he does? No one, except maybe dad, could just make stuff up and have it work because they say it works! His knowledge and ability to use it is bullshit and I want to know where it comes from!”

Mittelt's eyes widened in shock, “Are you saying he might be related to DAD?!”

Azazel scoffed and rolled his eyes, “Of course not. Dad died a long time ago and the kid is confirmed to be thirteen, well almost fourteen now. Besides, I checked already. Don't get me wrong though, clearly the kid is very intelligent and resourceful. The setup he had when I met him was crude, but it worked and he'd done it all by himself.”

Mittelt grunted and shook her head, “So, now what? The kid is missing the majority of his dominant arm. Clearly he's not going to be making anything anytime soon.”

Azazel waved his hand around airily, “Oh, I'll just have someone move in with him to protect him and give him a hand... Erm, pun definitely not intended. Even I wouldn't tell a joke that poor in taste.”

Mittelt had to restrain her laugh at the pun and only emitted a little snort. The kid meant literally nothing to her, he was just some random human stranger. So, why would she feel anything for his suffering? That's all humans ever did, live, suffer, die. She'd seen it happen a countless number of times both before and after he fall from grace over the course of millennia. So a terrible pun about some humans suffering was actually kind of entertaining to her. The deadpan look from Azazel kept her from smiling though as she asked, “So, whose the sucker going to be?”

Azazel slowly began to smile as he continued to stare at her giving her some idea of who he had in mind, “Oh come on! I've already got to be the gopher between him and you!”

Azazel nodded with a bright smile, “Exactly! Now you'll just spend most of your time here instead of at headquarters waiting for his calls.”

Mittelt groaned and sat at the table just so she could slam her head into it, “Why me?!”

Azazel snicker at her plaintive groans of annoyance and returned to his paperwork. This small incident had almost given him an excuse to ditch work but Shemhazai was a persistent bugger and insisted he take some work with him. He also spent his time pondering on the conundrum that was Junichiro. The kid literally had no way to know what he knew. Where did that information come from? What else did he know? What secrets were squirreled away in his brain? Not for the first time, Azazel wished he could read minds.

-----Line Break-----

A few hours later, Junichiro once more began to stir. His mind came online much faster this time so the moment his eyes opened he was looking at the stump that used to be his right arm. He moved his right shoulder and watched the stump move through the air with a sort of morbid fascination. It was so surreal to him. According to his perception, he'd had a perfectly functional arm just a few minutes ago. Now, there was nothing there and it was so weird.

A detached part of his mind was pretty certain he was in a state of shock, denial, or something similar that kept him from truly processing what it was he was seeing. Despite that, silent tears trickled from his eyes as a part of his mind processed his loss. Soon that loss coalesced within his conscious mind and became sadness. Though not for long as his sadness quickly morphed into anger and finally into rage.

His life had never been easy, even before he started living alone on the streets. Still, he'd always done everything in his power to survive, to move forward, to get what he needed to not just live, but to thrive! His Artificing had given him the edge he'd needed to become anything he desired. It gave him not just the illusion of power, but the promise that with time and effort he would truly become powerful. That he could earn his strength through his own sweat and tears, that he had the potential to stand at the top of the world.

Now he felt as if that potential had been irrevocably damaged. He needed both of his arms. Losing his left arm would have been bad enough. Running all of his equipment required two hands to be done properly. But losing his right arm? His dominant arm? That wasn't just bad, it was career ending. He couldn't even begin listing the many things that would suffer from the loss of his arm that were required to make anything functional.

It was too much and he let the world know of his agony and anger by screaming at the top of his lungs. He put every last emotion he could feel thrumming through his being into his shout. He poured everything he had lost into the sound and let it all out in the only way he knew how to.

The world felt all the more silent when the screaming faded away into nothing.

It was only a short time later that the door to the room opened once more and Mittelt, in all her gothic lolita glory, walked into the room, “Well, at least this time you didn't faint.”

A part of him wanted to deny that he had every fainted in his entire life. Fainting was just not something a 'man' would ever do! Except, he also couldn't bring himself to care that he had fainted and couldn't muster the energy to even try denying it. Instead he looked at Mittelt with his dull unfocused eyes, “Were you the one to save me?”

He asked because he remembered seeing the horribly burnt and managed body of the fish faced creature rising up from the flames. How it survived was beyond his understanding so he chalked it up to a combination of determination and physiology. The thing had just plain been tougher than he had imagined, simple as that.

In answer to his question, Mittelt nodded, “I did. I was still within the city getting the lay of the land since I'm going to be spending a fair amount of time here. I was only a few blocks away when you sent up the emergency signal so I arrived near instantly. You did a hell of a number on that stray devil before I got there. It took zero effort to finish her off and rescue you from the burning building. Hell, I don't know what you did but I barely even had to bandage you up.”

She gestured to the heart rate monitor, EEG, and nutrient drip, “Azazel came pretty quickly and we got you hooked up to some machines. He said whatever you did to save yourself took a lot of chemical energy from your body leaving you dehydrated and starving. You went through eight nutrient bags last night.”

Even as she was speaking, Junichiro's stomach let out a rumble that demanded it be fed. He nodded his understanding of the situation and ignored his stomach, for now, “The scroll I used to stop the bleeding greatly accelerated my natural healing. That energy and the necessary nutrients for cell growth had to come from somewhere.”

Mittelt nodded in understanding, “Well, lets get this crap off of you. After that, you can get some food. I bought some stuff for lunch and dinner from a nearby convenience store.”

She didn't mention that she'd only done so because Azazel had told her to. The pair of them remained silent as she stripped off the electrodes for the EEG and removed the needle for the nutrient drip from his left arm. It was only the work of moments to slap a small bandage on the needle wound. With all of that done, she fetched a yukata out of his closet, and helped him put it on. It would take some time for Junichiro to get used to missing his primary arm. Also, Azazel's orders were clear, she was to help him out until he could take care of himself again. If the pay wasn't so phenomenal for this job, she'd have quit already.

The pair made their way out to the dining room where Azazel was still doing his paperwork. Junichiro registered his presence but didn't dwell on it further. He was just going with the flow at the moment as he wallowed in self-pity and depression. At the moment he just felt like nothing mattered at all. It likely wouldn't last forever, but it was all he could do for the time being.

Azazel glanced up from his work to examine Junichiro but said nothing to him. Instead he returned to his work while the pair of them sat in silence. It didn't take long for Mittelt to fetch the food she'd bought. Since she didn't know a damn thing about cooking and the house didn't have a microwave, she'd bought food that could be eaten cold. To that end, she set a large platter of sushi in front of Junichiro along with a pair of chopsticks.

Junichiro glanced at the chopsticks and automatically reached for them with his right arm. His shoulder and stump moved, quickly reminding him that he didn't have the proper limb to eat with. Worse, the chopsticks were the extra cheap kind that needed to be slit in half to be used. With a completely dead look on his face, he decided to forgo any form of manners and just started picking up his food with his left hand. Luckily the platter only consisted of rolls, nigiri, and sashimi, all of which could easily be picked up and eaten.

The room remained devoid of conversation as he robotically ate every last piece on the platter. Only when he'd finished eating did Azazel speak up, “I owe you an apology Asai-san.” Given the situation, Azazel felt formality was necessary, “It was my oversight that led to you having to leave the house last night to fall prey to the stray devil. I wont make any excuses. Rather, I apologize unreservedly for your loss and the oversight of my workers.”

Junichiro slowly looked up at Azazel as the fallen's words trickled through his brain. His current depression and grief almost instantly transformed into anger. The anger he'd vented before came back with a vengeance as he shouted in Azazel's face, “THEN GIVE ME MY ARM BACK!”

To his credit, Azazel did not get angry at Junichiro for his outburst. Given his personal power and status it wasn't impossible that he could have taken offence to being yelled at by Junichiro. However, being as ancient as he was and given how young Junichiro was, he chose to let it slide. Aside from that, he did feel just a tiny bit guilty about forgetting to stock the kitchen in the house. Calmly, and with as much care as he could convey, Azazel addressed Junichiro, “I'm sorry, but we don't have anything capable of replacing a missing limb. Even the best healing Sacred Gear I know of, Twilight Healing, can't replace missing limbs. Maybe one could as a subspecies balance breaker, but I've never heard of it happening.”

Junichiro deflated at that, “Please, there has to be something you can do. I'd do almost anything to have my arm back.”

Azazel gave a sympathetic sigh, “I really am sorry kid, but there's nothing I can do.”

Junichiro knew that. He had nothing that could be offered to make Azazel help him. His mind spiraled down into depression as he tried to think of any magical ways to recover his arm. The Phenex clan had amazing regeneration, maybe if he stole some of their DNA and magically made himself into a Phenex devil somehow? But would that regenerate his arm, or would that be considered his default state at that point?

It wasn't until he remembered that in the canon story, Azazel had lost one of his arms in a fight. He also knew Azazel replaced it with a prosthetic made using his Sacred Gear research. He recalled how cool the rocket punch of the arm was. Remembering that gave him inspiration. It would be hard and he would need a lot of help, but he could do it!

Light returned to his eyes as he glared across the table at Azazel, “If you can't help me then I'll help myself. I'll make a new goddamn arm from scratch!”

-----Line Break-----

How'd you all like that? It's not much of a coincidence if it's deliberate eh?

Now, this might make Azazel look like a total dick, and to be fair, he kind of is sometimes. We all know he's been around for thousands of years, minimum, and fought in the great war. There's no way in hell his hands are even remotely clean. I can also see him placing Junichiro somewhere slightly dangerous to try and figure out what makes him tick. After all, once he understands something, he can control it. Just look at how he used Issei's perversion in the canon series. Not necessarily for bad things, but definitely to his own advantage.

So, I'm not trying to paint Azazel as pure evil, but more shades of gray. He made a mistake and it caused a problem, but it was still his plan for the events to eventually happen anyway.

Originally, I was considering rewriting the previous chapter due to a comment pointing out how out of nowhere and off the chapter was. However, another person (who wishes to remain anonymous) pointed out that Azazel setting up Junichiro actually made a lot of sense. As this chapter proves, I completely agreed with their opinion.

Just remember, it's not a coincidence if its a conspiracy!