42 Defrosting

Luck was a fickle thing.

Some days, it came to Parc in spades. These days he would consider to be the ones where he got Sheele to willingly go through with his worshipping, as well as the day he got his teigu and learnt it could control someones mind.

Then there were days were Lady luck decided he needed a reality check and bent him over and went to town. Today was one of those days, it wasn't as bad as when his mother was taken from him, no, he didn't think anything could top that.

But running into Esdeath again and subsequently getting caught by her after exhausting himself through overusing his Rush of the Nephelim ability, being frozen into a living sculpture, and now, slowly thawing his way out through the use of Bols flamethrower teigu set on its weakest flame, was certainly high up there in the list of days he wished he got sodomized instead. And he was REALLY not into getting sodomized.

"So, this is Parc Evans?" Wave asked squatting in front of Parc's frozen body as Bols flames rolled over Parc's back, still a good ten centimetres left to go before they'd even be able to talk to him. "He looks… normal."

'I could say the same about you,' Parc thought to himself within his 0-degree prison.

"I guess that's one of Night Raid down then?" He tilted his head and turned to the others, shivering not from the cold the sculpture behind him was exuding, but from the utterly terrifying eyes Seryu was giving said sculpture as she chewed on the tip of her thumb. Clearly not pleased with having to let one of her saviours murderers live.

Wave honestly felt a little sorry for Parc, not only was he supposed to be the lover of Esdeath, the strongest person in the kingdom. But now he also had the eyes of Seryuu on him. And not in a good, healthy sort of manner.

It was more like the moment he looked away, Seryuu would start shuffling through her arsenal of weapons until she got through all ten of them before sending Koro turn his body into pulp before repeating the process again and again until all that was left was a hole in the ground engraved with the words 'justice has been dealt' in a small plaque above it.

'Yeaaaahhh, I'm not leaving her anywhere near Parc on her own,' Wave promised, more for Seryuu's sake than Parc's.

To Parc, the ice was surprisingly 'warm' or at least, as warm as being surrounded by many, many layers of ice can be. He didn't have anything to really compare it to out of his own experiences, but he could come up with a type of reasoning for why he didn't feel completely frozen to the bones. He likened it to what he'd read up on the various types of diving suits, specifically the wet suits which trapped a layer of water between the skin and the fabric of the wet suit. This water would warm up from the body heat and essentially insulate the body.

And the fact he could just barely curl his fingers into the ice and wriggle his body helped with that reasoning as it proved there was at least some space for water to be.

Now if only he could come up with a reason for why he hadn't run out of air already. He wasn't worried about drowning as the ice melted, he'd just drink the tooth achingly cold liquids as the rose to his lips. Which was only rising faster the closer the likely extremely hot flames were getting to his body.

Another thing he had come to learn of, and he found this a tad humorous Was that when frozen and unable to do anything but watch people, you tend to get enough time to think of pointless things. Like why he could still breath, or about the layer of water around him insulating him.

As he had enough time on his hands, he shifted his eyes to look to Kurome who was standing silently a good distance from Seryuu and Wave who had just begun talking, Wave likely trying to help her with the whole 'I'm going to murder you,' look she was giving Parc.

Kurome seemed to notice his eyes locked onto her as Parc noticed her cheek twitch and a frown to form on her face. Internally he chuckled, externally, he shifted a little. She was apparently still not to thrilled about the whole, mind control thing going on with her.

Not that he'd stop just to make her happy. In fact, why not use something he'd learnt during his experimentations on danger beasts, on her.

'Turn around, walk towards the door, and trip in such a way that your skirt hikes up, make sure your ass is pointing to me.' Mind control came with a small perk of not needing to actually say anything to get the order across.

Cruelly he grinned as Kurome's eyes widened before narrowing helplessly, her body acting on it own and forcing her to turn away from Parc towards the door.

"Where you going? The Captain wants us to keep him in check when he thaws." Wave asked.

'Say you're out of candy.'

"I'm out of candy…" She said, her voice half-hearted and lacking in energy. Parc may be able to get her to say whatever he wanted, but he couldn't make her actually say it in an energetic way… without of course ordering it himself.

Wave squinted; his eyes drawn to her hip where a newly filled bag of candy was hanging.

"But you just…" he stopped talking the moment Kurome sent the deathliest glare he'd ever experienced his way. "I'll just shut up.'

Kurome continued walking towards the doors, at the back of her head she could hear Parc saying, 'don't forget to trip,' in a singsong voice.

Kurome groaned in silence as her right foot collided with her left, her body lurching forwards as her arms flailed in circles in an effort to keep herself upright, only, it didn't work as on the final spin of her arms, her thumbs caught the back of her skirt, pulling it up as her arms rotated up.

The sudden stop of her arms due to the fabric hooking onto them being the final straw that sent her crashing to the floor on her knees. Her chest being the only cushioning for her upper body while her arms just fell to the floor unmoving, her palms facing the sky. Her legs open just enough for everyone who'd been drawn to the sound of her falling to get a good look at her panty hose covered panties and crotch. A sight Parc would never get tired of.

Wave blinked rapidly, his face heating up, quickly diverting his gaze away, "K-Kurome, are you alright?" he questioned with a slight stutter.

'Don't move,' and she didn't. Her expression blank and unamused with what had just happened to her, never having changed throughout the entire ordeal.

When Kurome didn't respond, Wave ha looked back to her, naturally, his eyes as a budding young adult were drawn to Kurome's derriere once again. He couldn't let that get to him. Shaking the thought from his mind, he approached Kurome, about to help her up…

'Get up.'

…when she quickly got onto her knees, realigning her skirt to cover her butt-

'make this convincing. Show at least a little bit of embarrassment,'

Her cheeks grew ever so slightly redder, enough that her forced embarrassment was evident to Wave.

"I'm… fine," she hissed the last word. He hadn't ordered her to not talk on her own, so that was the smallest of bonuses for what just happened to her.

"Y-yeah, uh, here," Wave held his hand out to help her up.

She didn't take it, not because Parc ordered her not to. Just because she was too annoyed to even notice the gesture.

Wave swept his left out hand through his hair to divert his own embarrassment at being left hanging. "Looks like you're really going to need new candy now, huh." He commented seeing a bunch off cookies and hard candies littering the floor, the draw string to her candy bag having apparently come undone when she fell.

"Yes… I do," she felt intense hatred for a certain ice sculpture in that very moment, her eyes turning to look at him with a very loose and open scowl.

'don't look at me, you need new candy. Go get it. Just don't take too long,' Parc looked to Seryuu who had shuffle just a bit closer to him alongside her growling dog. 'I don't want her killing me the moment I get unfrozen.'

He didn't think he could stop her with the current state he was in.

Kurome turned away from Parc, "I'm getting new candy," she hissed. Leaving wave standing in silence watching her go.

"That… was weird. Even for her."

'You have no idea,' Parc chuckled as the main reason for that weirdness Kurome just showed.

Just then he could feel the radiant warmt across his body from Bols flames lessening, soon snuffing out completely.

"I'm done. If I go any further I may hurt him," Bols stepped around Parc who now had only just a centimetre or two of ice left on his body.

Wave nodded, focusing on Parc as small hairline cracks began to form on the surface of the ice.

***

*********

***

Big thanks to Will for your generous donation!

***

Yesterday was my first day back at work after this whole covid debacle...

Holy shit do I feel like I wasted 5.07 hours of my life I could have spent drawing or writing.