[center][h2][color=6ecff6]Vignette III[/color][/h2] [h3][color=7bcdc8]Code Red! (Part 1)[/color][/h3][/center] [hr] "Eh?" Ren muttered as he and his four friends ate at the table. "Ca-Crash? Is that some sort of chocolate bar?" If anyone out of Aurelia's best friends knew the most about bringing havoc- unintentionally or not- in the strangest of ways, Ren was easily the person who would probably know about it. But alas, he was only good at destroying his surroundings; he did not even know what the word "car crash" meant. "It's a thing," Alex explained as he used his hands to mimic a car crashing into another solid obstacle, "where you crash a car against something else." "Oh, you mean that huge rectangle-like thingy that's bigger than my mom-" "You're talking about a truck." "Oh. Then..." Ren held up his hands vertically and held them close to each other, signifying the tinyness of cars compared to trucks. "You mean [i]this[/i] thing?" Alex nodded. Ren nodded as well. Everyone continued to eat their rice and vegetables. "Wait, sorry," Elena muttered as she turned to Aurelia with a look of disbelief, "you just said a friend of yours directly crashed into a limo?" Blinking at her friend's confusion, Aurelia nodded slowly. One of Elena's eye twitched as the oldest of the three women also asked, "And he crashed while traveling at 130 miles per hour?" Aurelia nodded again. Elena threw her hands up in the air as she demanded, "How the [i]hell[/i] does that even work?! He should be in the morgue, not the stupid hospital!" "Dude, that sounds awesome," Ren said, his eyes wide with excitement. "If I can move that quickly, I can take all the muffins at the bakery and no one would be able to stop me! Aurelia, what did he drive?!" Alex muttered for the fifth time, "A [b][u]motorcycle[/u][/b]. I just said it like... six times. Or five. Or six..." As Elena continued to rant about the rotational motion of a motorcycle crashing into a limousine and the two men started playing a counting game, Esther pouted and looked up at Aurelia with a sad frown. The dark-haired girl noticed the blonde's concerned look as she turned to her. "So you're coming back late tonight...?" Esther managed to ask with the saddest pouty face one could imagine. "The PHC isn't that far from here, right? You better come back safely..." A small smile formed and replaced Aurelia's idle expression as she gently pet the smaller girl's head. "I think I'll be fine," she said. "Tell me you [i]will[/i] be fine, not that you [i]think[/i] you'll be fine!" Though she had confidence that Alex, Ren, and Elena could manage on their own, she had always worried over Aurelia whenever the dark-haired girl was left on her own. The years they spent together let all of them know that Aurelia had a strange kind of bad luck and a faint heart. If anything, all four of Aurelia's friends worried more about Aurelia rather than the most petite girl among them. "Yeah, promise us you'll come back!" Ren exclaimed with a grin. "I think you'll do just fine." "Says the person who doesn't know what a car crash is." Ren's face slowly contorted into a look of annoyance as he shouted, "Hey, you're not one to talk, Elena! I saw you fall into a basket of laundry filled with Aurelia's stuff in it. Unless you're into that stuff-" "SHUT THE $%#%$#%#$%#@$%#$%@%#$-" As Elena bolted up and leapt at Ren, who ran out of his seat at the table, Aurelia blinked and watched the two enter a game of cat-and-mouse, unaware of Alex's expressionless gaze to her direction. "Hey," he said with a calm tone, which definitely would have been covered up by the screaming in the background if his voice was not naturally strong. "If you feel like something's gonna happen, call me and I'll go and pick you up." The dark-haired newbie to Alegria attempted to give Alex a confident smile; ironically enough, her lack of confidence in making one winded her up with a mixed expression. "Alright." [hr] The Pavella Health Center lay not too far from Syca-Heights, though it did require a bit of driving to get there quickly. As soon as Aurelia arrived at Alegria, she found a red car sitting in front of the entrance. Yutaka waved from the backseat mirror at her, with Reggie and Cortez sitting at the front seats. The purple-haired cook sat with a grumpy frown, staring at the dark-haired girl with a raised eyebrow. As the back seat window opened, Yutaka waved fervently as he called out, "Aureliaaaaaa! We're over hereeeeeeeeeeeee! In case you haven't noticed usssssssssssssssss!!!" The timid girl raised a hand, unsure of how to respond as she went over and hopped into the car. During their trip to the hospital, Yutaka laughed out loud as he commented, "Gee, it's a good thing we open our restaurant a bit later in the weekends! Makes things a whole lot more convenient for me!" "Easy for you to say," Reggie growled as he drove the dinky red car. "I was supposed to get together with my friends this morning, but your sudden message destroyed my plans." "Oh? Ohhh! They're your delinquent bros, ri-" "STOP CALLING THEM THAT! And before you ask, no, we're not trying to do bad things, I just wanted to get together and check my homework." Yutaka gave him a cheeky smile. "Stop smiling like that before I destroy your face." "Destroy me? That's quite bold of you, Reggie. I didn't know you were into that-" The purple-haired cooke slammed the edge of the wheel multiple times as he screamed in frustration, getting a good laugh out of the mischievous Sous Chef. Cortez had no idea what was going on but she laughed the most out of the group. Aurelia glanced between her coworkers, interested in how they treated each other like good friends. The four eventually arrived at the PHC. The Health Center was a large building filled with doctors that served for many different purposes. It had veterinarians, dentists, and even chiropractors; it was quite the variety, even by large hospital standards. Thus, it was not surprising to see people going to the PHC if they were able to drive. Aurelia felt like a tiny speck of dust compared to the huge place. "That was fast!" Cortez echoed Aurelia's thoughts with a more excited demeanor than hers as she scuttled out of the car. "Wow, I forgot this place existed. Poor Sander is probably-" "His name is Xander." "-Oh! Thanks, Rechee." "..." "Poor Xander's probably just laying still in one of those hospital beds," Cortez said sadly before her expression quickly went from [i]super sad[/i] to [i]super excited[/i] in a second. "Well, that's why friends like us could walk up and make him man up! Right guys?" "Yup!" Yutaka answered, Aurelia and Reggie not answering because the former felt too nervous to answer properly and the latter just wanted to stop caring about the world at that instant. The only people that talked fervently as they walked into the Health Center were Cortez and Yutaka. Aurelia found out that they actually knew each other for quite a long time, with Cortez looking up to the man as both a good friend and almost an uncle-like figure. Yutaka saw her as a nice woman. ...He wasn't wrong, really. As they entered the PHC, Aurelia stuck close to Reggie, her nervousness almost getting the better of her. The purple-haired man told her, "You look like you've never been here before." The dark-haired addition to the Alegria crew nodded silently. Reggie gave her a good look for a few good seconds before following Yutaka and Cortez. [hr] Xander lay on a hospital bed with a cast on his head. "Oh," he muttered as he averted his gaze from the group of four standing at his door. What made him avert his gaze in the first place was the excited duo that had suspiciously wide smiles on their faces. "Thank God only your head is hurt!" Yutaka exclaimed in joy and relief. "If your hands were hurt, you wouldn't be able to cook. And you don't need a brain to co-" "Huh?" "Xander doesn't need a brain to cook!" Cortez chirped innocently. "All he needs are his brawns and-" "...That sounds mildly insulting," the blond muttered as he looked away from the hyperactive bunch. "Oh, I don't mean that, Xand," the Sous Chef quickly corrected himself with a smaller smile than before. "I'm just glad that you weren't hurt any more than this, which is already bad enough." "It's nothing much," Xander answered simply without a tone filled with emotions, though the way he responded instantly showed that he did care about Yutaka's words. Cortez's smile softened as she added in, "At least you're still energetic. You might not show it that much, but you're one of our most energetic crew mateys! I like you for that reason." The blond opened his mouth to say something before falling silent, looking away from the redhead. Meanwhile, Reggie just asked Yutaka, "When are we eating lunch?" "We'll actually be eating a bit earlier than usual today, Reggie," the Sous Chef answered as he turned to the mean-looking(?) person before turning back to Xander. "To keep ourselves in line with the weekend schedule, we'll have to hurry our pace a bit after this." "...Ye." "Don't worry about me," Xander grumbled as he stared at his blankets, trying so hard not to show the gratitude he felt to his fellow crew [i]mateys[/i]. "I'm fine." "U-Um," Aurelia started quietly before everyone turned to her. She fell silent. "...If you're gonna talk, just do it," Reggie said flatly. Walking up to Xander, Aurelia took out what appeared to be a cookie in a paper wrap from her pocket. She softly held it to Xander's direction as she told him, "I hope you get better soon..." When she blinked, the cookie was gone. The girl jumped in surprise and let her eyes fall upon the blond, who stared at her emotionlessly with a bulging cheek. "..." "..." Looking away from the girl, he mumbled, "It's not like I was hungry, okay?" Yutaka giggled like a school girl before he dodged a jab sent by Reggie. As he maneuvered his way out in the most annoying fashion for the purple-haired cook, Aurelia managed to make a small smile. [hr] As the group continued to loiter around Xander's hospital room, Aurelia walked out and went to the restroom. She washed her face, bar of makeup and the likes as she gave her reflection a good look. Thankfully, she did not look like she clumsily did her hair- with the help of Elena and Esther, she did not look like she came straight out of a bed. Although she initially feared that she was the cause of Xander's injury, his firm stance on the incident not being related to anyone but himself slowly made her believe him. It was disheartening to see or hear that someone got hurt, especially if she knew of such people. She could only be thankful for the fact that his injury was not too bad compared to the scale of his accident. [i]I should do more things for him,[/i] she thought as she left the restroom. [i]I think... he's a pretty nice person...[/i] As she walked out of the restroom, the girl with dark hair turned a corner. Before she was able to do anything else, however, she heard a man's scream approach her from the side. Aurelia turned her head as her eyes widened. A tall, red-haired man crashed straight into her, dropping stacks of paper. As the man tumbled forward, Aurelia fell and landed backwards, her eyes shut. "Ack! Sorry, I'm terribly sorry!" The redhead said as he got up to check if she was hurt. "Darn it, that was totally my fault..." "N-No, I'm... sorry," Aurelia whispered as he quickly approached her. "I... am alright." As the two's gazes fell upon each other, they froze deathly still as they peered into each other. "...?" "...?" "..." "..." "...!!!" "...!!!" Their eyes widened as Crash managed to let out, "Wait... Haven't we met before?" "Y-Yes!" Aurelia softly answered. "We... did meet before." "You're... You're the lady/man at the convenience store!" They both respectively exclaimed, equally surprised at each others' presence. Aurelia remembered meeting Caleb Waterfront before. Alex had befriended him and introduced him to her during her "job-hunting" days. He was a very, very warm-hearted man who had the tendency to put the consideration of others before his. This did lead to some awkward "consideration battles" between him and her, but they generally found each other to be good people. And Aurelia did not consider him to look bad. Not only was he nice, but he looked the part too. Elena had commented on that several times. The dark-haired girl blushed as she shook her head, reaching out for some of Caleb "Crash" Waterfront's papers as she attempted to pick his stuff up. Noticing her actions, Crash quickly picked up as many papers as he could to minimize the amount of things Aurelia retrieved for him. "I... didn't expect to meet you here!" Crash admitted as he let out a laugh, some of his nervousness fading at the presence of someone he met before. "Wait, if you're in a hospital, then... are you not feeling well?" Before he went into a panic attack, Aurelia quickly pointed out, "I... was visiting a friend." "Oh, whew! I thought I just crashed into a sick person. That would definitely be something I wouldn't forgive myself for." The redhead helped the girl get back up with his papers in hand. "Maybe we could talk a bit after I get these papers delivered?" Aurelia nodded with heat in her cheeks as he smiled brightly. [right][h3]Vignette III -END-[/h3][/right]