While Jecht was busy worrying about the lack of people on the streets, Trixxtal was too busy overthinking about how he should act when his brother opened the door. They had been writing each other for some time now, but they hadn't seen each other face to face since Trixxtal left France over a hundred years ago. And although his brother never seemed to resent him for leaving so abruptly, Trixxtal knew that he did. What if they got there and Alexandre slammed the door in their faces? What if he refused to let him see his son? And even worse, what if he told Jecht that Trixxtal wasn't even his real name?!!?!

All these thoughts were rushing through his head as they walked, so he paid no mind to the nature around them or the emptiness of the streets. Trixxtal could even feel himself slowing down when they got closer and closer to his brother's house.

When they stopped at the door, Trixxtal took a deep, relaxing breath. Okay. He could do this. He moved his hand to knock on the door, but stopped halfway, only hearing the last bit of Jecht's sentence. " Huh?" He turned to him, breaking out of his worrying thoughts and lowered his arm. " Oh, no, he and I were changed at the same time." Trixxtal lowered his gaze to the floor, the palms of his hands growing clammy. What a strange human gesture of him to do. " But when I left France, he went to go see our parents...or whatever was left of them. I think Alexandre said that our mother was still alive, but she died a couple years later. Then he left France too, met his wife, and then moved to Italy. She's is from here, so I guess that's why Protettore's name is in Italian..." He smiled to himself and looked back up at the door. He wasn't going to back down! He wanted to meet his nephew! He was just going to have to face his brother, whether he liked it or not!!

With confidence flowing through his body, Trixxtal knocked on the door!

And then knocked again!

And again!

And again?

After a minute passed and a few more knocks, Trixxtal completely deflated, his shoulders drooping. " I knew it. He hates me." He whispered, his hair covering his face in the most depressing way imaginable.

Protettore knew this wasn't going to be a good day when he was violently awoken from his sleep. He had been dreaming of nice things; puppies, flowers, rainbows and most importantly, his parents. He was wrapped up in his parent's arms, sandwiched between their bodies with a soft, happy puppy in his arms. Nothing could ever be as good as this~! Protettore thought happily to himself. His parent's loving arms left him momentarily, but as Protettore looked up, he saw them approach him, with the biggest cup of blood he had ever seen. Since he was such a kindhearted boy, Protettore never had the balls to suck the blood directly from a human before, so his parents, mainly his father, spoiled him and put the fresh blood into a cup for him to drink.

" Here you go son~" His father smiled, his golden hair shielding his eyes.

" We love you~" His mother cooed, her hair hiding her face just like his father.

But still, a smile of complete happiness spread across Protettore's face and he could feel tears well up in his eyes. " Momma! Poppa!" He dropped the puppy without thinking, stretching out his arms to hug his parents. But before he was able to reach them, he was shaken out of his dream, his parent's happy faces fading in a instant, only to be replaced with a face of a furious stranger.

" W-what are you..? Who are you?!" Somewhere, deep down, Protettore felt like he knew this stranger from somewhere.....but from exactly where, he didn't know. He tried shrinking his shoulders and started to back away from the man, but his hold held him firmly in place. He couldn't hear the man's next question because of how violently the man was shaking him, and all Protettore could think about was how to escape. He didn't even know there was another man in the room until he moved the blond one away to take his place. When the hand wrapped around his neck, all the small boy could think was, "OhGodOhGodThey'reReallyGoingToKillMe!!!Momma!Poppa !Someone!SaveME!!" and when he was forced to look into the other's eyes, he almost wet his pants. Never before had he seen such.....such unrestrained evil before. If that blond guy wasn't going to kill him, this man certainly was.

" P-Pleas-" He was cut off when a knife was pressed to his throat. "OHGODTHISISIT!GOODBYELIFE!" He silently cried to himself, tears falling down his cheeks. He was so busy freaking out that he didn't hear most of what the man with the knife had to say. He did catch the last bit though. " P-Please don't kill meeee!" He cried, a pitiful hiccup leaving his throat, " I-I live here!! P-Pleaseeee! Don't kill meeeee!!" No longer could he hold back the tears and they were now freely flowing down his cheeks, snot and whatever else running from his nose. It was a real wonder how Protettore had the ability to cry like that with a hand wrapped around his neck.

"P-P-P-Please!!! M-m-m-m-my name's P-Protettore!!!! Don't kill me!!"

☆ trixxtal ☆

Trixxtal's eyes widened at the sound of the name. " Jecht, let go!" He shooed him away, removing the knife at the kid's neck. He was still skeptical, but this kid knew his nephew's name, so even if he was lying about it being his name, maybe he knew where his brother was. " How old are you?" He ordered coldly, his eyes staring straight into the little kid's.

" ....Eight..."

" And you live here? For how long? What did you do to the people who lived here?" The Protettore he knew was only a baby, not an eight year old kid. But Protettore wasn't a popular name and Trixxtal was pretty sure only one as bold as his brother would give his son such an obscure name in all of Italy.

" ...M-My parents....were taken away...." The little boy replied, hesitantly reaching to the nightstand by the bed to pick up a picture. Trixxtal's eyes followed his hand and he snatched it up before the kid could grab it. He scrolled over the picture and to his surprise, he saw his brother and his wife.

" Look!" Trixxtal turned to Jecht, pointing to the smiling brunette in the picture. Next to him was his wife, with an equally large smile, and between them was a small boy. Trixxtal looked up from the picture to look at the boy, and then back to the picture frame. Though the picture looked old, probably from a year or two ago, he could tell that the boy in the picture was the boy in bed.

His eyebrows knitted together in confusion.

Protettore's gaze fell to the floor and he fumbled nervously with his fingers. " Um......" He tried to think. It had felt like weeks since his parents were taken, but Protettore knew this wasn't so, it was just his mind playing tricks on him. " It's been.....twelve days. They were taken....by pirates!" Suddenly, his eyes gre cold as he dragged his gaze to look up at the two men infront of him, " Pirates like you!"

☆ trixxtal ☆

The small boy was trying his best to look stern and intimidating, but after living with Jecht for x amount of time, Trixxtal had become immune to any piercing glare that wasn't Jecht's. Instead, a smile spread across his lips. Dropping the picture on the bed, Trixxtal wrapped his arms around the boy's small frame and hugged him tight, nuzzeling his cheek on Protettore's head. " Oh! I've waited so long to meet you!!" Happiness overwhelmed him, even after just hearing that his brother and sister-in-law had been captured. Atleast they weren't dead and rather than meeting a little baby, Trixxtal had a child as a nephew!

Pulling away and allowing the boy to breathe, Trixxtal smiled fondly at him, " I'm your uncle! Oh! You can't imagine how much I wanted to meet you! Oh! This Jecht," He jestured over to the man behind him, not bothering to go into any more detail about their relationship, " And don't worry. I'll do everything in my power to save your parents! Afterall, I can't abandon my brother like that!"

Turning around, Trixxtal looked over at Jecht, " We are going to save them, right?"

( *whispers* ollllldddd wrrrriiiittttiiinnnggg)

" B-b-b-b-b-b-b-but...!" Protettore tried to tell Jecht that there was no way that he was going to step foot on a pirate ship, but the man's face alone was enough to make him remain silent. He could only watch as Trixxtal, his "uncle" nodded to the scary pirate's words and blew him a kiss goodbye.

" See ya later honeybunny~!"

But as soon as the door closed behind Jecht, Trixxtal dropped onto the bed, making Protettore dive out of the way if he wanted his life to be spared. From the bed, he could hear sobbing and loud moaning. Suddenly, little Protettore was confused. " U-um...a-are you....are you okay?" He tried to reach out to touch his uncle's shoulder, but before he could, Trixxtal shot up into a sitting position, hugging a pillow to his chest, tears streaming down his cheeks.

" No! I'm not okay! My dear older brother, my precious Alexandre was taken and there isn't anything I can do about it now! I just have to wait for Jecht to find something out, and who knows if that will even work!"

Still confused about the sudden personality change, Protettore reached out and gently petted his uncle's arm for comfort, " I'm sure he'll find something..." He felt like he was supposed to the be one crying like a child, not his full grown uncle!

And just like that, Trixxtal sniffed once, twice, and then his sobbing stopped completely, tears and all. " Thanks. I don't like for Jecht to see me crying like that." The blond haied pirate sighed and stood up, moving Protettore out of the way, and flipping his hair out of his face, " Now, I'll help you pack! Ooo. Kkkk. Aaa. Yyy~?" He smiled sweetly.

This was the first hint Protettore got about how his life would be like on the FlyingDeath. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to be excited, or terribly horrified.

Thirty minutes later, Trixxtal had all of Protettore's clothes, personal items and any other valuable items all packed away into two rucksacks. The pirates who had invaded the house before had taken mostly everything, but Protettore managed to keep some valuable things, like this parents wedding rings, a couple family pictures and other things like that. He silently said his goodbyes to the house and followed Trixxtal outside to the abandoned streets. He explained that their ship wasn't docked too far away and that the walk would be short. On the way there, Protettore asked Trixxtal a few things about his life, such as:

" How do you drink blood on a pirate ship?"

" Do you get into any pirate battles?"

" How long have you known the guy with the scary face?"

" Can I have a dog on board?"

By the time they reached the ship and Trixxtal helped him on it, he knew everything there was to know about being a pirate! Well, as much as an eight year old needed to know.