When she heard them coming, Mayako knew it was over. Emma was going to be arrested and probably locked up, taken to Galaens, and held accountable for crimes of arson and attempted murder. She was probably going to be thrown in a jail for years and years on end. There wasn't a thing Mayako could do to stop this. Emma sat up and dropped her arm to her side; she didn't try to stand, crawl away, or run--in her own right, she was resigning herself to this. It wasn't like she could stop it now; if she ran, they'd catch up to her. If she fought, they'd surely defeat her. On so many levels, there was nothing she could do.

On instinct, Mayako wanted to ask Fenix what he thought he was doing, but somehow, deep down inside, she felt like she had an idea--and suddenly, she felt guilty, horribly guilty. She sniffled and looked up to Fenix as she felt her heart drop down to its furthest reaches. He was protected Emma. Despite everything, he was taking the blame. Why, then, should she feel guilty?

Because she was letting it happen.

Mayako didn't play along, though; she dropped her head and shut her eyes; she really was going to let this happen, and not speak a word against it.

Emma, however, stared at Fenix with a mixture of confusion and contempt. She couldn't believe he was going to do this, and she had half a mind to admit to it--but in the same right, there was a part of her that didn't want to spend years in jail, either. She hung her head, watching the ground with a furrowed brow and narrowed eyes. As if to make herself feel better about saying nothing, she adjusted her bangs, pulled them back from before the right, damaged side of her face, and let them remain before the left, untainted side.

Fear and apprehension lay thick over the crowd; a few made good on their instincts and simply ran away, but soon a cacophony of voices raised. Some called him a demon, a devil, a spawn of darkness. Others simply wondered what they'd just witnessed. A few made suggestions for what to do with him: kill him, lock him up, leave him there, whatever. None doubted that he was capable of being the culprit anymore, and for many that was enough proof that he was guilty.

They were the same reactions Fenix always got when people saw his magic--it wouldn't have made a difference if there were no fires, if none of them were injured it all. It would be the same thing.

This was, however, the first time he was glad for it.

As the crowd grew increasingly agitated Rebbecca knew that if she didn't speak up soon things might get out of control. "Quiet, quiet!" she shouted. Fortunately, when Rebbecca Tsukimono spoke, people who knew what was good for them tended to listen. "Regardless of...what he's capable of, he's terribly hurt, and the girls need attention to. I need a volunteer to help me get them to the clinic. Urikuse can start treating them, and then we can discuss what to do with him." There was a twinge of sadness in her voice, but probably only Mayako and Emma would pick up on it.

The blacksmith easily hauled Fenix off his feet, causing him to wince and Rebbecca to glare at him for a second, before holding him as gently as he could and starting towards the clinic.

Rebbecca herself went over to Emma and Mayako. "Come on, lets get you girls taken care of," she said softly, glancing between them with motherly concern. She offered an arm to each of them to help them up.

"M-mn . . ." Mayako hummed in painful response as she accepted Rebbecca's arm.

Emma looked up to Rebbecca for what felt like hours. The woman was offering her help; here Emma was, geared up and ready to light the whole place and herself on fire or perhaps just up and leave the village without a word. She was dressed, packed, and ready to go-- to Hell or to Galaens, it didn't really matter. Rebbecca hadn't a clue what Emma planned to do, but she must have known that Emma at least had no intentions of staying here.

And yet, she still offered her arm to Emma. After Fenix went so far as to sacrifice his own integrity in this village's eyes, and now with Rebbecca--

Emma didn't know what to think.

Rebbecca must have thought she was horrible, the way she was looking up to her. Her bangs were still over the left side of her face; she was still looking up to Rebbecca with the damaged, bleeding, and scarred side of her face. Emma looked away from her, a brief feeling of shame falling upon her heart as the motion had her hair fall before her face equally.

The help wasn't accepted, at least not directly. She glanced from Rebbecca to Mayako at her side, before getting up on her own and passing the two with eyes downcast. Without a word, she retrieved her wooden sword--following which, she'd reluctantly follow Rebbecca Tsukimono and Mayako back to the clinic, with an almost insistent distance of at least ten paces between them, the whole way there . . .

If Rebbecca thought she was a monster or even thought ill of her at all, it didn't show. Instead, she gazed down at her with only compassion and hint of sadness. And perhaps Emma would recall that it wasn't the first time she'd looked down at someone important to her, someone battered both physically and emotionally, who was stretched to their breaking point.

And just as with that person then, regardless of her own wishes, now she could only let Emma make her own decisions. That was part of growing into an adult, even if part of her wanted nothing more than for her to stay and be able to care for her and shelter her forever.

She brought them into a clinic, although into a different room than before. The room where Emma and Fenix had been staying was now closed and locked, though Urikuse could be faintly heard, scolding whoever was inside.

Once in the hospital room, however much Emma might want to keep her distance it would prove impossible. Rebbecca immediately started examining her, intent on treating her first, seeing that her injury was slightly worse than Mayako's.

That look-- it ensured that Emma walked several paces behind them. It forced something to weigh upon her heart, something she hadn't felt in a long, long time, something she couldn't find a word to, not yet. Emma brought her wooden sword with her; she trailed it through the grass and walked slow, but she followed, and entered the clinic behind the others.

Her cheekbone was horribly damaged. In Hillcrest, there were very minimal treatments for it; minor applications of healing suave and antibacterials, but her cheekbone was broken. There was no cast to put on this to ensure that it healed in the right shape. The most one could do for such a wound was to make sure that no infection came of it--much like they did for the scars on Emma's cheek, right below the break. At least there, though, dental surgery allowed them to keep her from losing most of her teeth on the right side of the jaw . . .

In treatment, Emma winced once--but that was all. There was a powerful numbness in her face, one that made the feelings in her face less . . . painful. It wasn't a satisfying numbness, though. This numbness commanded her to keep her eyes averted from Rebbecca at all times. Was it shame? Some mild shame, creeping its way into her heart? She hadn't felt such a thing since the day Davis left; everything became shameless, everything became twisted. The Tsukimonos ensured that she did not end herself because they wanted her to hurt some more, because Hillcrest wanted to keep her, because the world wanted another person to be cruel to. She'd have gladly accepted Hell over this world, back then.

Emma said nothing. She could think of no words to say, only a want to pull her knees up to her chest and try and pretend that perhaps she wasn't real. That would be better than thoughts of what next, and especially better than all thoughts of Rebbecca.

Rebbecca could only guess at what Emma was feeling, but the fact that she did not try to refuse treatment she could only take as a good sign, even if she was unable to look at her. It was enough so that when she was done treating Mayako's nose (which fortunately looked like it would heal fairly quickly) she felt safe in leaving them alone for a few minutes while she checked on her husband and the young Black boy.

She wouldn't be gone for long, but it was long enough that if either Mayako or Emma had something to say to the other away from her ears, their get the chance...

Left alone, Emma and Mayako were silent. Neither looked to the other for several seconds; it was Mayako, of course, that made the first movement. She glanced to Emma, who did little more than stare at the mattress in thought. Mayako opened her lips to speak, but stopped, not because of the pain in her nose, but the pain in her heart. She lifted her hand to the middle of her chest, as if to grasp her own heart, as she tried to force back her fears.

It was, admittedly, a bit difficult to do when she could only breath out of her mouth.

". . . Emma," Mayako began.

But she paused at length. Mayako wanted to speak--she wanted to say anything, to speak from her heart in any way she could. There was so much she could say, yet she could find so few words. She couldn't say that she didn't blame Emma, because that would be a lie. Emma was undoubtedly to blame, but so were many other factors--especially that which influenced Emma.

In truth, there was only one thing Mayako could say.

"I-I don't hate you."

At last, Emma looked at Mayako, and met Mayako's empathetic stare with her own cold one. Staring at her like this, Emma felt experienced a powerful feeling of regret. Here, Mayako was being honest; she didn't hate Emma for what she did, even though she should have. She had every right to hate Emma. It was wrong to return her gaze with a cold stare, and she knew this, but couldn't bring herself to do anything beyond this.

Truth be told, there was some part of her that felt relieved--but likewise guilty, self loathing, and angry. Emma couldn't explain why she felt this way--or, rather, why she wanted to say the exact opposite of how she felt, but she did.

"I don't care," Emma said finally.

Mayako averted her eyes from Emma, and for a long moment, neither girl went so far as to look at the other. It was Emma who looked to Mayako first, this time with a much softer, potentially apologetic expression, but Mayako already had her eyes shut sadly. There was little that could be amended here without speaking, but Emma couldn't bring herself to think of the right words to say--let alone voice them.

When Rebbecca returned a few minutes later, she wasn't alone; her husband followed her into the room. While she could tell something must have happened while she was gone--Mayako looked downcast, and Emma seemed a bit more reserved than before--what it was she could only guess.

With a nervous glance to each other, the doctors did something unorthodox: they took off their lab coats. It was something they rarely did within the confines of the clinic, but...what they had to say next wasn't from the Tsukimono doctors; it was from Rebbecca and Urikuse.

Silently they lowered themselves onto one of the beds, facing Mayako and Emma. For several moments they struggled with what they wished to say; as doctors they could calmly talk about anything up to and including death--they had a lot of experience with that. This was something else, however...a foreign territory neither had much experience with, save with their son, but it came naturally then. Now...

"You girls have lost a lot," Urikuse finally spoke up, getting right to the point. "More than anyone should have to lose, young or old." Though they were both estranged from their own families--and more recently their son--they still at least say they had families, and that perhaps one day they could return to them. Even they could not fully comprehend how Mayako and Emma must have felt.

"And we know there's nothing that can replace it," Rebbecca continued. "But...you're very dear to both of us, and not just because of Eld. You've been coming to your clinic almost all your lives...we've watched you grow up...grow up much faster than you should have to..." she trailed off sadly.

Urikuse rested a comforting hand on her leg before going on. "What we're trying to say is...no matter where you might go, or whether or not you can or even want to work--" he looked at Emma and Mayako in turn. Indeed, there was little chance that they failed to pick up on Emma's readiness to leave.

"No matter what you might do, or experience, or anything in the world--" Rebbecca chimed in. "We want you to know that you still have a home, here, with us." She couldn't help sniff a bit, and even Urikuse's eyes seemed watery.

They loved them, as sure as if they were their own children. To see everything that happened to them, all that they had taken away, broke their hearts. As doctors, it was easy to get lost in their work, to keep themselves busy and avoid having to face any aspect of tragedy other than the medical side of it. But they couldn't do that here--in truth, they hadn't been able to for some time, the scare with Emma prompted them to make sure their feelings were known before it was too late.

Emma regarded the Tsukimonos with the utmost surprise. When they came in, sat down, and began speaking to the girls, she hadn't expected what they had to say--and yet, it was in the midst of it that she averted her eyes from them and stared down at the mattress on which she sat. She regretted the decision with almost every bone in her body, but she consciously tried to block them out, just as she had with Mayako just a moment earlier.

Mayako, however, couldn't take her eyes off of them. Truth be told, she'd never given much thought to her relationship with the Tsukimonos. They took her in when her parents died, and then she worked for them. She always thought that was the deal, that she was just something of a permanent volunteer at the clinic, and she was perfectly fine living her life like that--just working herself to the bone, distracting herself from all that happened here in Hillcrest, from thinking about all the people she lost.

Perhaps that was how the Tsukimonos were able to get along so well in such harsh of times, after losing their son and watching the village practically fall apart around them.

She felt the urge to tear up, just as Rebbecca did. Mayako wanted to sniffle and maybe hold back that urge, but she couldn't; it simply hurt too much to try. She sniffled once, realized that she couldn't breath out of her nose, and experienced a strong tinge of pain. Emma really did a number on her nose; it was probably one of the worse physical pains she'd experienced in her life. The whole Vaerbond family had some underlying strength going for them, even if they didn't always look it.

And so, she couldn't stop from tearing up. This was the first time she really gave her relationship with the Tsukimonos any thought. Maybe she really did still have somewhere left to come home--maybe she really could live with the Tsukimonos, and regard them as guardians.

Or maybe . . . maybe it had been that way all along . . .

"T-Tsukimono-sama, I-I . . . I don't know what to say," Mayako whispered; it was quite obvious that she was touched by Rebbecca and Urikuse's sincerity. "I-I . . ."

But she was interrupted--she paused once, and during this pause, it was Emma instead that broke the silence; Emma, reacting in a way that several months ago she would have condemned.

". . . I think I'll pass," Emma declared under her breath--a shaky declaration, the exact opposite of her true feelings. "I'm better off homeless."

One less home was one less home that could be burnt to the ground. One less home was one less tragedy she could experience. Maybe it wasn't quite the opposite of her true feelings after all--or maybe it was just a mask for them, a convenient mask crafted by irrational logic . . .

As Mayako spoke, Urikuse got up and walked over to her, resting a hand on her shoulder just as Emma replied.

Rebbecca got up as well, and stood over Emma for several moments. But then she smiled, bent down, and enveloped her in a hug. "It's okay," she whispered. "We're just as scared to lose you." Many times before she'd seen that front--sometimes it was bravery, sometimes sarcasm, other times humor, but it always masked the same thing: fear. And if there was one thing they saw at a hospital, especially during trying times, it was fear.

And that was normal. Even they weren't immune to it. They'd practically confined Emma to a bed, because they were terrified they'd lose her if they didn't. But now she knew they needed to trust her...because if they didn't, she'd never learn to trust herself again.

"You don't have to say anything," Urikuse finally told Mayako. Before he'd left, Eld made them promise to watch out for her--and he had a good reason for it. But the truth was that they would have whether he'd asked or not.

". . . th-thank . . ." Mayako began, and though she couldn't finish that sentence, Urikuse and Rebbecca would know very well what she was trying to say, and just how much she appreciated what the two had to say, as Mayako, already misty eyed, leaned into Urikuse, throwing her arms around the man's neck and pressing her face into his chest. It was both the utmost appreciation and a longing for some semblance of comfort, which would be evident to Urikuse, as by that point, Mayako was softly sobbing. So much had happened so quick, and the only chance to cry about it, something she so badly wanted to do for so long, was wasted days ago, when she screamed instead. Now, however, she could cry.

Emma, on the other hand, said nothing. She practically winced when Rebbecca embraced her, as soft of an embrace as it may have been, and she made no motion to return it. Instead, she bit her lower lip and turned her head to look away from Rebbecca. This act of defiance was undermined by the simple fact that, whether Emma knew it or not, she was trembling.

". . . why?" Emma asked at long last, her voice higher in pitch, as if she were choking back her feelings, refusing to let them go without a dam, "I-- I'm just an ungrateful brat. I'm just a stupid, ungrateful brat! Why-- why would you be afraid to lose me? You should just-- you should want me gone, like everyone else!"

Indeed, her voice rose in pitch as her eyes began to sting, but Emma didn't let the tears come, and she fought to keep her hands down on the bed, to keep them from rising up and accepting Rebbecca's embrace. She shut her eyes to force her tear ducts into submission and tensed her hands into tight fists.

This time, however, she hadn't said the opposite of what was on her mind. Emma shouted the exact turmoil in her heart that kept her from being so accepting as Mayako, Mayako Takamine who was so willing to accept the possibility that there was still a place for her in the universe. Emma just couldn't do that.

Urikuse returned Mayako's embrace, one arm holding her and the other gently stroking her hair. How anyone could possibly betray her, let alone a father, he didn't know. His instinct was to fight tooth and nail against anyone who would do her harm, even as just a family friend.

In response to Emma, Rebbecca pulled away slightly, but keeping her hands on her shoulders. She needed to giver her answer while looking directly into Emma's eyes, her own ones too expressive to leave any doubt that she meant what she said:

"Because we love you."

For what felt like hours to Emma, she stared into Rebbecca's eyes. Mayako was over there, over on the other bed, crying quietly and holding onto Urikuse, and Emma was still trying to hold back the urge to do the same. She already cried, some weeks ago--or maybe a month or two? She could barely remember when the last time she cried was, only that it lasted awhile, and then she stopped, stagnated, and tried to end herself in the most efficient of means, going so far as to slit her own wrists and hide this fact in extremely elaborate ways.

She'd always thought the Tsukimonos were just trying to keep her from leaving, but the truth was that they loved her, perhaps like a parent and their children.

Emma, despite her age, was a strong girl. She was painfully logical and capable of deductions and mature thought processes more often seen in twenty somethings. She went so far as to do the work for a pharmacy that usually required a couple of collegiate degrees . . .

But no matter what, Emma was still just a twelve year old girl-- a twelve year old girl that had just tried to burn her village down, only to learn that there were still people left there that loved her.

Emma suddenly felt all the guilt the world had to offer.

She tried to hold it all in, but at that point, every dam that held her guilt at bay broke down at once, and still looking into Rebbecca's eyes, she teared up almost instantly. Emma tried to stop it, but as soon as she took a deep breath, one that sounded much like a high pitched whine, before she shut her eyes tight and let out that breath in the form of a sob.

It was the first time she'd cried in a long time.

Rebbecca wrapped her arms around Emma again, holding her tightly. Perhaps she was too used to her empathetic son, who always seemed to be able to sense how people felt whether they said it or not; she truly thought Mayako and Emma would have already known.

But rather than wasting time wondering what would have happened if she'd just spoken sooner, she was merely glad that from here things would get better.

***

With a small sigh of relief, Fenix took his ear away from the wall. He couldn't tell exactly was what going on, but he could tell well enough that it seemed like everything was going to be okay.

It wasn't his problem, he knew--and while he did owe these people, he shouldn't have cared either way--but...even so, he couldn't help but be glad.

Tomorrow, he could leave with no regrets.

It was early morning that Fenix Black would be woken from his slumber, however light of a sleep it may have been. It would be somewhat of a rude awakening, as he'd be pushed and pulled rather quickly and harshly (albeit by weak arms) to rouse him as hastily as possible.

"M-Mister Black," he'd hear a female whisper.

Upon waking, he'd find that the source of the disturbance was none other than Mayako Takamine, standing next to his bed, a pair of keys in hand, and dressed down head to toe in dark clothes--black slacks, a dark purple sweater (that matched her hair perfectly, actually), and dark slip on shoes. Her hair, which wasn't that long in the first place, was pulled back into a short pony tail to keep her bangs out of her eyes.

Fenix would find that she had a rather serious expression upon her face--dreadfully serious, in fact--and had a heavy bag over her shoulders that she strained to keep up. It was heavy to her, but it'd be lightweight to Fenix, more than likely.