Rider smiled as she used the reins to drive her beloved Pegasus towards the apartment, patting him gently on the mane as she did.
"Good boy", she said, smiling, as she approached the apartment at supersonic speeds. She had no time to waste, after all.
In no time she had arrived above the apartment.
Hmm, how should I get in? she thought, momentarily.
She listened for a moment, but she heard nothing untoward going on, although everyone seemed to be collected in the kitchen.
Well, I'm not in a hurry, so I guess I can just ring the doorbell....
"OK, you can land now" she said to the winged horse, patting him once more.
He did as asked and set her gently on the ground. Rider climbed off his back and, still holding the reins, rang the doorbell. However, she did not tell him to leave just yet. After all, he had just given her a ride to the compound, it was only fair that she give him a little bit of affection in return.
As Shuya had noticed, Kiyoshi was indeed not happy, and Shuya's arrival only made him feel even worse. The guy was clearly and obviously a bad guy, and as far as Kiyoshi was concerned there was no reason whatsoever for him to be here. At least the vampire seemed to care about other people.
Kiyoshi listened to Shuya talking about Dead Apostles, before he then turned and addressed Kiyoshi himself.
"You seem to take the fact that she would attack someone way better than expected, kid. Anyway, isn't she supposed to be back by now? Perhaps, things didn't go all too well with that dude. Maybe, it wasn't a good idea to let her go alone to that bastard's castle..."
Kiyoshi looked at Shuya with contempt.
How dare someone like him judge Aunty Rider. What else was she meant to do? Die?
Had he not heard Jack's words about her return, Shuya's comments would have worried him. As it was, though, he was confident that Aunty Rider was just fine.
Before he could reply, though, Rin spoke up.
"Castle? Wait, Satoshi is in a castle?" she said with a white face.
Taking out her phone and showing surprisingly-good telephony skills she dialed what was, presumably, Satoshi.
"Get here now" she spat, clearly angered.
Ah, I see, I think she just realised he's turned Dark....
"Ok, now seriously out of the kitchen, I need the space people", Rin repeated calmly, before taking out a marker and writing on the wall.
What is Aunty Rin doing? he thought.
Whilst the tone of her voice indicated that she had been making a request, the way she had gone about it, as was typical of his Aunty, had been rather abrupt and demanding about it. And, then, she'd taken out a marker and started drawing over the wall of someone else's house. Kiyoshi trusted her enough to believe she had a good reason, but even as a twelve-year-old child he could see that it wouldn't come across very well to everyone else.
As he'd expected, both Lancer and the darkened Archer spoke up, clearly irritated with her words and actions. Then, Ryoko turned to address him.
"Kiyoshi! Hey, how's it going?" she said, before turning to also castigate the alternate version of her mother.
"It's going well, thank you Ryoko-nee. Aunty Rider is coming back soon!" he said, excitedly. "Are you OK?"
Whilst he was speaking to Ryoko, the vampire addressed everyone else before, finally, turning to Rin.
"Like hell I'm leaving here. Not until I can apologize to Forest, and make sure this Rider won't try and eat anyone. No matter what you say kid, I'm not trusting someone smelling like blood", he said.
"Aren't you a vampire?" he said, scowling, clearly unhappy at the guy's hypocricy. "As for Aunty Rider, I don't know what happened to her at the castle, but Jack told us that she's returning right now, so I'm sure she's fine."
Then, he sighed.
"Look, Aunty Rider is really nice and kind. She would never cause real harm to anyone. It's not her fault she needs prana to live.", he said, addressing Jack and Shuya.
Then, he turned to the others.
"Look, I'm sure Old-Aunty-Rin didn't mean anything bad. She just wants to bring some drink in for everyone to enjoy, and she's not used to having to ask permission to do things...."
Then, he moved behind Taiga's wheelchair, preparing to push her, and then addressed the two of them.
"OK, do you guys want to get out of here like Aunty Rin asked?"
Before they could move, though, he heard the doorbell ring.
"That must be Aunty Rider!" he said with excitement.
He turned to Lancer.
"Do you mind if I let her in?" he said, excitedly.