Puppet Without Strings

A cheerful hummimg noise filled the dark street at night, a girl took bouncy steps towards her house, the soda cans inside the polythene jingled along with her steps.

While walking, her step got caught on something thrown on the street, making her stumble forward.

"What the—.." Her voice died down when she saw a human lying on the ground.

She carefully squated down beside the figure, making sure to keep her distance just to be safe.

"Excuse me, Mister, hello?" She shook him slowly, but he didn't seem to budge.

She sucked in a breath when she saw his bleeding forehead and busted lips.

'Dang, is he a gangster? Shit, should I just go? "

For a moment, she wanted to leave him there and go her own way, but her heart didn't agree with her mind.

"Sir! Hello! Wake up!" She tapped his cheek several times, but when he didn't wake up, she tapped it hard enough to create a sound.

Yeah, she slapped an unconscious man.

But to her surprise, he actually jerked his head to the side, mouth opening slightly before his eyes.

He saw a girl staring at him, even though the curtain of her brown hair covering the sides, her concern was obvious on her face.

He instantly sat up with a gasp, looking around him and scaring the girl to the ground.

"Where the hell am I?!" He glanced all around him.

The girl was still on the ground from the shock until she gulped down her fear and stood up, looking down at the man who seemed very distressed.

"Uh.. excuse me?" He looked up to her, glancing over her head for a second before focusing back on her face.

"Where am I?" He asked, finally calming down a bit.

"It.. it's the South B-23."

The guy let out a series of profanities under his breath as he covered his face.

"Are you okay..?" She asked again, getting an angered response from the guy.

"Do I look okay to you?!" She flinched back at the loud voice and bit her lips, deciding to turn back and run away from the man.

But before she could even take a step, he looked up straight at her. "I'm sorry.. didn't mean to scare you or anything,"

"It's.. okay.." She spoke but didn't make any further effort, neither towards the men nor to run to her house.

"Anyway, even though you didn't do anything, thank you, you can go wherever you were going," He gestured his hands over to her before falling back on the street, knowing very well he couldn't go anywhere, not in this state.

She furrowed her eyebrows. Who was this man to say she didn't help him? He would've still been passed out if it wasn't for her.

However angry she might be at the man, she couldn't just leave him after what she had witnessed.

"Do you want any help getting home?" The man opened one of his eyes to peek at the girl.

"You didn't go?"

'I should actually leave you after looking at your terrible attitude, but be grateful I'm being kind.'

She wanted to say all that, but she settled on repeating her previous question. "I asked; do you need help getting back to your home?" She smiled from outside but cursed the man in her head.

"No." And he turned away from her, using his hand as a pillow.

"You stubborn idiot." This time, she didn't hold back and went to grab the man's bicep to pull him up.

But there was just a small difficulty. A Grim Reaper is much more powerful than a mere human.

"What do you think you're trying to do?" He raised one of his eyebrows at her when she wasn't even able to move his hand.

"I'm trying to get your stubborn bum to a safer place than a street, so get up."

"And why should I do that?" The girl let out a frustrated groan as she slapped his bicep.

"I'm trying to help you here! You should be thanking me properly! But here you are acting like a stubborn kid!—" Her sentence was cut off when the Reaper got up in an instant and looked directly in her eyes, making her breath hitch.

She could be wrong, but for a moment, she thought she saw his eyes glow a dark shade of purple.

"Did I tell you to?"

"Huh?"

The Grim Reaper moved away from her face, "When did I ever ask for your help? And didn't your parents teach you that you should stay away from strangers? Why are you acting like you've known me forever, huh? Just get on with your way and forget you ever saw me here."

He tried to get back to laying on the street, but a tug on his suit's jacker prevented him from doing so.

He glanced at the hand on the jacket than at her face and immediately panicked through him.

"H— Hey! Why— why are you crying?!" The girl had her lower lip between her teeth while her eyes were filled with tears on being told off so rudely.

"I.." She sobbed, "I just want to help you—" Another two sobs, "But you keep denying me, what if you die here?! I can't live like that!"

For a moment, he almost wanted to laugh out loud. This human was worrying about a Grim Reaper being dead. How naive could humans be?

He would've just flicked it off if it was someone else, but somehow, he couldn't bring himself to do the same to this girl.

"Hey, what'll get you to stop all this?"

The girl looked at him with the same teary eyes before speaking, "Come to my home with me, I'll tend your wounds, then you can go wherever you want.."

He didn't want to, but he couldn't say no, and hence ended up agreeing to it.

The girl stood up first and held out her hand, while the Reaper took it just to keep her heart.

But just as he proceeded to place his left foot on the ground and applied pressure on it to get up, he was struck with an inevitable wave of pain that hit him like truck, back to the ground.

"Huh? What happened?" He glanced at her face once again, knowing very well she won't be able to support him.

But he can not even use his powers in front of the girl since she's a human.

He stood up once more, tolerating the pain in his leg with groan.

"Is your leg okay..? You seem to be in pain—" But he shook his head before she could speak further and just hopped forward.

"No, I'm fine, lead the way," She seemed unsure and wanted to offer more help, but she knew her capacity.

The girl took one step at a time to make sure the guy took his time in walking, too, since there was clearly something wrong with his leg.

"This is the apartment building I live in. There's a lift, and my room's just beside it, so you won't have to walk much now."

He nodded with a small pained smile and focused on keeping his left feet off the ground.

As they reached in front of a black coloured door out of many in between the pure white walls of the apartment. She put the password in for the door numbered as 411 while the guy was too busy looking around a human residency.

"Come in," She pulled him inside as his curious eyes scanned the whole place, a kitchen right on entering attached to a hall with a television in front, beside which two doors were present and two more on the wall perpendicular to it.

"Sit here, I'll get the first-aid kit." She pulled out a chair from the dining table and made him sit on it.

He was more than happy to finally provide his leg some rest after walking all around.

He heard a few crashes coming from one of the rooms, but he couldn't care less.

"Annika? What's all this noise?" Spoke a new voice emerging from the door beside the T.V. wearing purple silk pyjamas, her black hair flowing along even without the wind. Her face looked as if the god himself had carved with tender care, providing her sharp features. naturally curled lashes and a face without a single flaw.

But her beauty wasn't the thing that caught the Grim Reaper's attention. It was the writing above her head that made him stop functioning.

Age: 224

Species: Nine-Tailed Fox

Annika stepped back in the view with a first-aid box in her hands, "Oh Kiyora, you weren't asleep?" She walked over to the dining table and set the box on it.

"I was, but then I heard all the commotion—" Kiyora stopped talking when she saw an unfamiliar man sitting on the chair as Annika tended his messed up face.

"Who's this?" She walked closer, examining him closely with furrowed eyebrows.

"Oh, he was lying all beat up on the streets, so I took him here to clean his wounds." He hissed when Annika accidently pressed hard on the wound on his forehead.

"Ah, sorry."

'Does she think I'm some kind of a puppy?' He scoffed in his head but didn't say anything.

"He doesn't look homeless, judging from his clothes," Kiyora said, referring to the clothes the Grim Reaper wore, a black three-piece suit.

"Who the hell said I'm homeless?" Who does this low-class think she is to even think of him as someone who's homeless? Her eternal life could end just by the snap of his fingers.

"Dang, calm down, mister. I didn't say you were." She rolled her eyes as another door's click caught their attention.

"What's with all the commotion— Who is this beat-up thug?"

'Are all human this dumb—' He interrupted the thoughts in his head when his eyes went to scan the top of the newcomer's head.

Age: 112

Species: Werewolf

The guy wore a wonderful looking wolf cut on his head, his face unlike the girl's wasn't free of flaws, rather he wore a scar that ran from his right forehead, passed his bright golden eyes and ended on his cheek, aligning with the end of his nose.

'Ah, that's why.'

"Ah.. sorry Elikko, did I disturb your sleep?"

"Not only his, but ours too." Two more newcomers enter from two different rooms, one girl from the place where Kiyora came from and the guy from where Elikko came.

"I'm really sorry guys," Annika apologized, not looking at them, but rather focusing on the Grim Reaper's wounds.

But he did. He did notice all of them and the writing above their heads, too.

Age: 245

Species: Siren

He wasn't really surprised, just like the previous nine-tailed fox, this siren was exceptionally pretty with her long brown hair waved around her face covering the sides, her face a perfect heart shape with beautiful pink eyes enclosed in long curled lashes.

Age: 324

Species: Vampire

As his eyes landed on the vampire, he was already looking at him with wide, red eyes covered with the messy bangs above his boney and pale face.

"Guys, I'm sorry, but I found this man on the steets, and he looked pretty beaten up, so I felt bad and bought him here—" As Annika explained, the Vampire stepped forward, cutting her off.

"But you can't just bring anyone inside, Annika." He held a dangerous eye contact with the grim reaper while walking towards them.

"Azura's right Annika, he could be a murderer for all we know," It was Elikko this time, and he knew if anyone could differentiate him from humans, it would be those with an exceptional sense of smell.

"But guys I—"

"No, I know you're empathetic, but you can't just empathize with anyone you find on streets and bring him home. He could've done something to you on the way. Have you ever thought of that?!" Annika flinched back when Azura raised his voice, her eyes once more filling up with tears.

"Azura." This was the first time the Siren had spoken up, her voice threatening yet beautiful.

"You better watch your tone while talking. This is not the way you talk to Annika." She warned as she went over to the intimidated girl and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Annika didn't have any bad intentions, and no one can really do anything with us around. You do get what I mean, right, Azura?"

"I get what you mean very well, Blair, but what if he did something on the streets?! Do you not understand the seriousness of this situation at all?!"

"That's enough, Azura." Kiyora snapped at the vampire's direction. "You've said enough, and you aren't required to open your mouth once more. All that matters is that nothing happens. Can't you live with that?"

The Grim Reaper had had enough of these creatures talking so lowly of him. He won't just sit here accept the insults that are being thrown his way by the creatures much below than him. No, never.

His hand that slammed on the dining table was what paused the enraging argument in the apartment as every eye turned to him.

"I'm not in any of your's debt that I will sit here and just casually listen to all of you insulting me like this. I've had enough. I never asked for this girl to help me. And I still don't need someone's help." As he was about to stand up from the chair, Annika's hand on his shoulder stopped him from doing so.

He saw the same watery eyes that had pursuaded him to follow the little girl all the way to this place on a broken leg when he could've very well healed it with the powers provided to him.

"No, please, you— your wounds, I still haven't cleaned them.."

"You don't have to. These will be fine in a few days." They will be fine the second he runs his hand over them.

"But— your leg," She tried again. She didn't want the man to leave looking like that. When he looked, he could collapse any minute. Annika didn't want to keep any regrets in her heart, that she didn't help someone she could.

"It will be fine too. I better be off now." He kept in all the waves of pain that shot through his leg as it touched the ground, but he's sure. He will be fine once he gets to use his powers on it.

Annika watched helplessly as the man slowly stumbled over to the door with the support of whatever he could find. She wanted to stop him, but she couldn't.

She just watched as the guy grabbed the door knob, turned it, and just as she thought he was going to step out, he didn't.

Instead, he froze in his place for a second before falling on the ground with a loud thud like a puppet without a rope to support it.

♡♡

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