Chapter Text
It's a typical rainy day in Great Britain.
The streets are very empty, as you keep walking into this evening.
There is a wooden door inmidst all of this modern housing.
If you would be a tourist, you would think that this wooden door would lead into an ancient history museum of England but no, this door leads to a humble apartment, inhabited by a very humble man.
There even is a little lamp next to this wooden door, its shining, it looks quite comfortable and inviting, you approach this spot and you take a deep breath and close your eyes for a moment.
A rather strange sound appears and as you turn, you can see the vague figure of a, it must be a man, standing right in the entrance of this apartment and holding this wooden door with one of his hands.
He is staring straight into your direction, not moving. It's dark in his corridor and as your eyes get used to this dimness, you realize that he is dressed in complete noir clothes.
Oh no, what he might just think! You realize that you are far too close to his property, you didn't want to appear inpolite at all.
Nervously and shy you immediately stare down to the ground.
Your body starts to shake a bit in fear as your nervousness just seems to grow like a linear function.
V notices your tension very well.
"Good evening," you can hear his incredible polite voice.
"Good, uhm, evening. My apologies I did not mean to appear offensive or so in any way if I came to close to your housing."
The light of the lamp is now revealing the man's face, as he cocks his head to the side.
You can see that he's wearing a mask, well a quite unique one in your opinion, you like it. Already you have the feeling that he is somehow outstanding.
V is staring like that at you for a while.
What you can not see is his small smile behind his Vendetta mask.
Your clothes are soaked from the rain, and V doesn't want to look at you in such a condition any longer.
"I can see no reason that would inquire an apology of yours. If you might follow me," he says simple as he turns and walks back into the building.
You bite down on your lip. You somehow trust him. He doesn't look like the rest, you have to be really brave to appear like that, you think and with quick steps you follow him.
He leads you like a gentleman to a separate room.
While walking through his apartment you noticed a massive amount of books and those were just the first corners you saw.
"Can I ask a question?" you have to ask him, you can not follow him in silence.
"Sure."
"Have you read all of these books here?" The numbers of them are already sprenging the one hundreds.
"Of course I have," he answers just as polite as in the beginning.
"That is astonishing," you comment.
"I would consider this as normal," V comments back, he opens a cupboard and takes out some fresh, clean and dry clothes.
He puts them on a little chair, in front of you, after he quickly removed the books from it, and he walks out of the room and you can see him turned with the back towards you, waiting for you to change.
"Oh, thank you so much," you use this opportunity, its already getting a bit cold from the rain, you quickly change into the clothing he offered you.
"Ready," you say and the man turns back to you.
"Marvelous," is what he says, he makes a gesture which signals you to follow him further.
You enter his living room, the chimney is already on and in front of it is a huge armchair, on its left and ride side are tall piles of books.
"You have more books than a library!" you say smiling.
V nods, he eyes you very carefully.
"A cup of tea?"
"Yes, please."
V goes to the kitchen nextby, he prepares a cup for you and himself.
As he returns, he offers you a seat opposite to his armchair, which you gladly take.
You receive the cup of tea and you notice that he even wears gloves. Black ones of course to suit the rest of his outfit. Even inside here he keeps to dress like that, which you find interesting.
"Thank you," you start to blow the air over the cup a bit since the tea is still so hot.
V observes you. He is sitting in his armchair, holding a cup himself.
"May I ask what brings you out to the streets at this unspecific time?"
The man turns the spoon inside his cup and looks at you. Well, or better said his mask looks at you.
"I....I am homeless. I was wandering around searching for a place to rest. And then I saw this little lamp next to your door, it looked inviting so I approached this spot and took a breath."
He nods, "Homeless? May you explain the circumstances?" V asks curious.
"Sure. Oh sorry. Well, it just happened. I was thrown out or better said kicked out of university and since then its like that."
You shyly take a sip, its not easy to talk about that but you somehow like to talk to this man.
"May I ask for the specific reason that lead to your, kicking out, as you paraphrased it."
"Oh sure. Yes. Well, I was too critical as they said, they did not wish to have critical thinkers as they called me one, at their institution. So they threw me out."
Silence, the man even stops to swing the little spoon in his cup.
"I thought that especially these institutions are the places where you develop critical thinkers but no. Not today. It seems as if you are the modern heretic of the 21st century if you think critical or dare to express some critical arguments vocally."
V shifts for a moment in his position, he puts his head a little bit more to the left side, studying you intensely.
"I bet, uhm what is your name?" you continue.
"V," his answer is short, just like the size of the smallest particle.
"I bet when I would be in the so called middle ages, they would have thrown me already onto the pyre and burnt me alive. So I can be rather happy that they just kicked me out."
V leans forward, those are some very hard words of you, they touch his heart.
"You certainly should keep this brave attitude of yours, you did the right thing," he says after another round of silence where he just stared at you again.
"Do you think so?" you look at him with big eyes.
"Very yes. From now on, consider this as your home. If you might want to join me," he offers you out of nowhere.
You are speechless, does he really want to have a stranger, you, in the midst of his chambers??
"Really?? You would allow me to stay with you?"
"Of course," V keeps looking at you as he drinks his cup of tea.
"Oh thank you so much!!" you almost shout.
V nods approving, and as the smile beneath his mask grows due to the acceptance of his invitation so does his hatred for what happened to you.
You suddenly put your hands on his legs, you are so excited, "This is so nice of you," you say and V almost spills his tea.
No one has touched him like that, especially that close in the last couple of years. He surely did not expect you to be kneeling in front of him now with your outstretched hands on his legs.
He clears his throat as he grabs his cup harder and stares down at you.
"A pleasure," are the collected courteous words that barely make it through his throat.
You quickly take your hands away in shock, oh no you somehow have the feeling that you were too stormy.
Sitting back on your place, you finish the cup and you blush extremely.
V can watch how the colours of your cheeks change, and he likes it.
"If you feel tired, I may offer you the second room close to this one, it has a bed in it, which will be yours."
You nod calm, you try to not storm on him again, "Yes I would like that. Thank you."
"The bathroom, one, will be shared by both of us, if you agree," V continues.
"Yes. Thank you, no problem."
The man points towards this living room, "Feel free to walk in, whenever you want and whenever you like. This applies to the other rooms as well."
You nod, "Thank you again."
Tiredness takes over your body and the man notices it.
He leads you to the bed, gently, he puts the blanket over you as you lay down, he watches you like this for some seconds.
Then V walks to the door of this room and he turns off the light.
Immediately, you close your eyes and you fall asleep.