(BL) Hunting The Field Guide - Chapter 359

Chapter 359: The wheels have to start turning
When Kellen and Rhys got the knock from Brent that Taylor had arrived, both of them had calmed down significantly. Kellen had stopped crying, and Rhys had joked that he looked good with tears in his eyes.

It had taken Kellen a minute to get what he was implying, but when he did he had gotten flustered and smacked his shoulder. Rhys had laughed, and it was around that time that Brent had knocked.

The trio headed towards Kellen’s apartment, Brent silent, and his face unreadable. Kellen didn’t know what that meant, and that continued into his entering the apartment.

Taylor had Gunther sitting at the bar, her supplies spread out to tend to his wounds since she wasn’t allowed to heal the outside wounds. Her back was to Kellen and Rhys as they entered, so they couldn’t see her expression. Kellen didn’t think he needed to.

He could feel the anger radiating off of her.

Gunther’s face was hidden by the pillar in the kitchen, so he wasn’t able to see what she was working on either. What did surprise him was the fact that Casper was still hovering around. He was a few paces away from Gunther, a frown on his face, his arms crossed, and he looked awful. He probably looked the same way that Kellen had. Puffy, red and watery eyes, cheeks flushed but face pale.

Kellen wondered why Rhys liked to see him like that. Kellen hadn’t seen Rhys crying when they’d been together, and he wasn’t sure he’d be into it. He liked him in different positions.

Casper glanced towards them as they entered, and gave Kellen a weak smile before he turned his gaze back to Gunther. Kellen’s Dad was over with Charlie on the couch, the two of them speaking quietly to each other while both kept an eye on the situation. Kellen was glad that they were both here. It felt a little less stressful.

“Kellen, can I have a word?” Brent asked, and Kellen turned his attention to his right hand man. He stared at the unreadable expression on his face, before he glanced back at Rhys.

He had no doubt that the man wouldn’t run away, especially now that Taylor was here. She wouldn’t let him get away, S Class or otherwise. Kellen was curious what Brent wanted to speak about, so he nodded and gestured towards the upstairs.

“Is my bedroom okay?” Kellen asked and Brent nodded. Rhys reached out, squeezing Kellen’s shoulder and causing Kellen to turns towards him before he began to head off with Brent.

“I’ll be down here, like a good Esper. No need to worry about me.” He assured him but Kellen blinked.

“Oh, I know you aren’t going anywhere.” Kellen told him, and Kellen’s Dad nearly choked. Rhys’ lips froze, before he broke into a wide, goofy grin. He nodded repeatedly, chuckling.

“You know it.” He agreed, his yellow eyes sparkling and Kellen didn’t know why he was so happy. Brent snorted, before grabbing Kellen’s hand and dragging him towards the stairs.

“You can flirt with Captain Thatcher later, alright?” Brent said and Kellen agreed. He could, and probably would flirt with him later.

He let Brent pull him up the stairs, and close the door behind them once they got there. He waited in silence for a moment, both of them standing and watched Brent as he watched him.

“I know this is the worst time to bring this up, but I…might have to go to the front lines sooner rather than later.” Brent muttered, and Kellen frowned.

“Why? What’s up?” Brent had never brought this up before, so yeah, it was sudden, and he wasn’t sure where this was coming from. Brent sighed, raising his hand and running it through his hair. It was his prosthetic arm, and Kellen watched as it didn’t curl the full way. Brent frowned, before switching hands.

“I…I don’t know if you’ve noticed how I haven’t been wearing my arm as much as I normally do.” Kellen hadn’t, at least not consistently. He did notice it on occasion, but he didn’t think anything of it. Apparently he should have, because he was bringing it up.

“I’m sorry, but I wasn’t really noticing that.” Kellen admitted and Brent chuckled.

“Yeah, I had a feeling. I’m not saying this in a way like you should have, I just meant…ugh, I hate telling you this.” Brent muttered and Kellen settled in. He was waiting. Was he about to hear a bit more about Brent’s background?

Brent glanced at him, looked away, before he sighed.

“I…normally get new updates and shipments for prosthetics from…” He trailed off and Kellen waited. He could wait. He’d even be fine if Brent dodged the truth. It was okay, but it was clear that he wasn’t keeping it from him because he didn’t trust Kellen. Brent might have, no, probably did think it was a burden. “I get them from my grandfather.” Brent finally said, and it was not what Kellen was expecting. “He sends them through a third party. Always has, but I haven’t seen or heard anything from the third party. They work on the front lines, that’s where their office is, so I need to go check. This one is acting up, and I’m actually behind on when I would normally get a new one.” Brent told him, and Kellen remained silent for a moment longer.

Brent grew nervous as Kellen didn’t respond right away, but Kellen was trying to wrap his head around what he had just been told. Kellen had, up until this point, assumed that Brent’s whole family were bad, or at least bad to him. He hadn’t really considered that one of them might have been okay. He thought maybe it was a family friend if anything, but an actual blood relative?

Kellen was a bit relieved to hear it.

“Well, then we need to get you to the front lines, don’t we? We can’t have your arm acting up and hurting you.” Kellen finally said, but he wasn’t smiling. He was trying to think about the logistics of getting Brent there. “We could speed up you taking the group to the front lines, and you can check on where your next prosthetic is, while also using the training session as an excuse.” Brent blinked, before he started laughing.

“Thanks for not making it a big deal, Kellen.” Brent said, and Kellen gave him a confused look.

“Why would I make it a big deal? I told you already, Brent. I’m fine with whatever, as long as you aren’t lying about our friendship.” Brent’s tense expression relaxed completely, and he let out a sigh.

“Yeah. Of course. Okay. I knew I shouldn’t have been worried about telling you, but I just got into my head about it. I was sure you were going to ask a bunch of questions, and it’s already hard to speak about him.” Brent said, his face turning. “Due to…reasons, we can’t contact each other.” Kellen’s heart ached. He did want to ask, but only because it seemed like it was hurting Brent.

“I’m genuinely sorry to hear that, Brent, especially if you liked to be around him.” Brent nodded, his face twisting before he sighed.

“I just hope…no, I shouldn’t even say it. It’s okay. Honestly, I just wanted to tell you a bit about what was going on, and some of my worries. We don’t need to push the plan ahead. I’ll manage.” Kellen wasn’t going to stand for it. Honestly, they had all been so cautious around this gate, being so careful, that he felt like his world had been put on halt.

It didn’t feel bad, per se, but he felt like now that it was interfering with his work, it was time to do what needed to be done. He was going to have to ignore the fact that as a Guild, they were going to be down a core member of their team, and instead focus on the fact that it was an opportunity to grow more core members of the Guild. Esper Blake was a good option to grow, as well as several other people like her around her.

They had already been slowly stepping in as more members had joined the Guild. Kellen didn’t think it was time to expand how many Lieutenants that Rhys had, it was Rhys’ choice after all, but they needed to put more people in place so that if a fallout at this level happened, or if they needed to mobilize people, there were people in place to do that. It wasn’t just reliant on like, four people.

“No, we should. I feel like we’ve been dragging our feet on this, and honestly, the Saturn Guild before the gate opened spent a lot of time on the front lines. Hill should be out there, instead of doing whatever she’s doing now.” Brent’s lips twitched, and Kellen realised that might have sounded bad. “She’s not doing a bad job, she was just-you know what I mean, Brent.” Kellen was grasping at straws, and Brent just started laughing.

“I know. She was out there as much as we were. I get what you’re saying, but she’d be devastated if she heard you say it without any context.” He snorted, laughing, before he sobered. “I agree. It feels like everyone is just holding their breath. I know that you’re the one who kind of said that this was a dangerous situation, but we can’t be afraid. There could be things that could help us in those other gates to conquer this one. You give me the word, and I’ll be there.” Brent said, giving him a small salute and Kellen rolled his eyes, before turning and opening the door.

“We’ll have to make a plan. I’m thinking most of the first class is ready to go. We could draw straws, take half at first, and then rotate?” Kellen suggested and Brent nodded.

“Sounds good to me.” He agreed easily and Kellen chuckled. He really trusted him with this. It was nice, and hopefully, the time that they had taken to chat was enough time for Gunther to be finished getting treated and now it was Rhys’ turn.