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Shiori nodded. "That's true..." she agreed, thinking a few more moments. "Alright. I'll give you a chance, but you're going to have to work for it." she decided with a sweet smile. "I'm not easy by any means."

Kaguyo sighed. "That may be..." she paced, looking at the walls, "But we need to figure out how to stop him. We need to know his weakness..."

Yuki frowned, watching it closely. "Just wait." she advised. "Keep some distance..."
She had a bad feeling about this suddenly.

Shiori smiled.
The rain was only a drizzle now, and the clouds were starting to break.
Success!
"Alright." she whispered, leaning up to kiss him gently. She was blushing the entire time at this point. "Perhaps we should go inside."

"Time to talk to Aled." Kaguyo sighed. "Hapushi, onegai, if you could call up the lab again..?"

But little did they know that the lab was in some serious trouble.
Yuki was flung across the room like a ragdoll, crashing into a table full of beakers and analyzing equipment. She slumped to the ground, groaning in pain.
Smoke... she could smell smoke...
What had happened???
"I... I think..." she coughed, trying to find her glasses, "...I know, what's to worry about... Daijoubu ka, Watari-san?? Doko desu ka???"

Yuki almost fainted, to say the least, but the first thing she did was run and let Po-ar from the containment pod.
The next minute she was grabbing the patches Watari kept on hand for Aled, kneeling at the scientist's side.
She was absolutely frantic.
"W, wh, what do I do Watari-san??" she asked, trying not to panic, "C-c-can, can I remove, the, the..."
She was almost crying. This had to be the worst accident she'd ever seen...!
But she didn't wait for Watari to speak, he was too weak for that.
Instead, she carefully removed the shard, slapping on two patches and giving him a shot to prevent major blood clots.
Those could be just as deadly as the wound itself.
"Don't die..." she whispered, "Stay with me, Watari-san..."

Shiori nodded, slowly rising to her feet. "I can show you my home." she decided quietly. "What I consider home, anyhow..."
There was a little beachhouse a short ways offshore, made mostly of darker wood.
She carefully slid open the door to reveal a house big enough for five. It was pristinely clean, as her mother always had it; there were three children's rooms that glowed in the sunlight.
Despite this, two seemed lackluster and faded in comparison to one. It had to be Shiori's room, decorated with butterflies and flowers.
"This is where I grew up." she whispered, looking around the house. "This is home..."
She could have cried, she missed the place terribly.
The kitchen was just as neat and tidy as the rest of the house, save Shiori's room; that was messy. To his surprise, they seemed to have been living quite comfortably for someone he had recently saved from the streets. It was sophisticated but simple, elegant but durable. After all, with three kids, hardly anything lasted forever.
A cat crept out from her room, padding over quietly and pawing at her leg.
She scooped him up into her arms, holding him close. "I never knew what happened to him." she whispered, scratching behind his ears. "We just left... I know he's... he's gone, by now, but I miss him. I wish I knew what happened... Whether he found a new family... or... or anything, really... Gomen nasai... I... I don't have very many things to show you that aren't sad."

"Most likely not." Kaguyo sighed, "But something's better than nothing, right...? This is our best bet... I'd suggest returning to the Palace, but with drop-out rates here, and Aoki being around, I doubt we'd be safe..."

"And leave you where Aoki could break your arm, and send this world into chaos? Never." Kaguyo shook her head. "I won't."

Yuki didn't even speak, she was so scared.
She jumped to her feet immediately, preparing the pod right next to Shiori's for the scientist.
The first thing she did was as soon as he was nearby, she applied the air mask to his face.

Kazuhiko jerked suddenly. "Oh... oh NO..." his eyes widened, releasing Fir. "Watari-san!!!"
"Kazuhiko, don't!" Eara shouted, but the boy was gone in a second. "Shiiitttttt...."

"WATARI-SAN!" he cried out, trying to heal him however he could. "Wh.. WHat HAPPENED?!!"
"He saved me." Yuki admitted quietly. "That should've been me..."
As she and Po-ar carefully lowered him into the tank, Kazuhiko began to bless and charge the healing fluids with more energy.
"I won't let you die..." he whispered sadly. "Don't worry..."

Shiori thought over that hesitantly.
To have a place such as this....
"I have somewhere to live now." she whispered. "Someone else could use a home more than I..."
To see her sisters' rooms again would have killed her outright. It was hard enough to contain the heartache she felt looking at the empty house now.
The topic of family depressed her as much as it did Aled.
"I...I don't know... This.. this is the past, p, perhaps, perhaps this, this place, is where it should be..."
She tried to focus on her 'breathing, looking around. "So many memories here... Nostalgia kills you I think sometimes." she mused mostly to herself. "You can't breathe... can't think of anything but pain, or what you did wrong, or wishing vainly for those moments again... Iie... perhaps this is better left behind." she sighed. "My old home has no place for me now."
Ok, so perhaps that was a bit pessimistic, but still....

Shiori seemed deeply saddened by this. "I didn't leave the past." she sighed quietly. "The past left me. I have no place here anymore...."
She watched him, gentle but confused.
Why was he smiling at her?
"Hasn't yours left you also?"

Kaguyo nodded with a sigh. "I suppose." she agreed quietly. "But what about the base...? The revolutionaries..."
Perhaps she had to start throwing rocks at the beehive, so to speak, start getting people riled up.
It was a thought.

"Your blood exploded." Yuki answered quietly. "Whatever it's tainted with is explosive... I'm going to need more samples, onegaishimasu. I'm going to try and figure out a cure...."
But with Watari out of commission..
She lingered near the pod while Kazuhiko laboured on sealing the wound in his chest.
If she thought she was tired before, she couldn't wait until a few days from now.
She wouldn't be able to sleep with her idol possibly dying like this.
She'd take good care of him.

"You remember that stuff Watari and I couldn't identify?" Yuki asked solemnly.
She didn't need to answer more than that. Her gaze lingered on the scientist, sighing deeply.
He needed to survive this. She'd make sure he would.
"I'm going to work on a stronger healing liquid for the rejuvenation chambers." she declared suddenly, rising to her feet. "Ouji-sama, you're more than welcome to hang around, but I fear I won't be able to get much done without Watari-san... I'm nowhere near his genius." she sighed deeply.
This was going to be hard.
"But..." she took another sample of blood, "I'm going to see if this substance can be filtered from you... Like dialysis." she explained. "There might no be a cure, but there might be a way to get rid of it."
The question was, what to do with those cells once they were collected?
If that small of a sample of blood exploded like that...

Kaguyo shook her head. "I don't want to push this on you anymore than I have to." she watched Hapushi carefully. "You were just attacked... you need rest!"

Shiori softened a bit before nodding. "You focus only on what matters from day-to-day." she answered. "Focus only on the things immediately at hand, on the future... You forget the past, no matter how painful. You never REALLY forget, but..."
Her brow was furrowed painfully, the woman trying to explain and endure the old wounds opening up.
"...but you can try." she sighed. "You just... go. You don't linger anymore... but... I have no roots." she shook her head. "I don't feel like I belong anywhere... That brings its own sort of pain, Aled-san. There's a delicate balance I suppose. I haven't found it."

But Yuki did the first thing that came to mind.
She dove into the tank, carefully holding Watari still.
She rested her head on his undamaged shoulder, a warm, calming feeling radiating into the scientist's body.
'Rest, Watari-kun...' she spoke gently, 'Rest... Stay with us... You can't leave us yet. Rest.'
He was starting to fall asleep.

Kaguyo grinned. "I do." she chuckled. "I bet they're distant relatives... Figures they're both some of the only people I trust." she smiled faintly. "Always have their eyes open."

"Day-to-day." Shiori nodded, watching him shyly.
She still didn't know what to make of this man. He was intriguing to her, but she always went into everything cautiously.
"When you're poor, you usually focus on filling your stomach, finding food on a daily basis. The pain of hunger hurts so badly you can hardly think about anything else short of those who put you in that place to begin with."

Shiori thought for a while. "You... to a point. Mostly my sisters." she answered hesitantly. "Freezer, for the war... my parents, for having to be in the army... The people who mugged me from time to time.. I don't know how I avoided being raped... Miracle, really.. The men who left me hoping, the other two that my sisters are currently wedded to now..."
She was quiet, leaning on a countertop as she watched him. "In truth, I think I hated everyone until I met Yuki." she admitted. "I wanted revenge on nearly the entire damn planet."

Kaguyo smiled a bit. "I think I see where you're going." she nodded. "I've always wondered that myself, but Watari-kun never said anything about family..."

Yuki continued to hold him, head resting against his. 'Daijoubu ka, Watari-san?' she reverted from the -kun slip earlier. 'What's wrong??'