CHAPTER 3

The pain was overwhelming. Mamoru Nanami had felt pain before, he'd spent years training for the Force, overwhelmed with years of pain, rubber bullets and the bruises that came with kendo training, but he'd never felt pain like this. It felt like his guts were threatening to spill out of his stomach, and fall out onto the floor. His vision was terrible and he couldn't hear the threatening voice of the chibi soldier telling him his vitals were failing anymore. He knew his implant had either malfunctioned or been removed by someone in the panic. He looked up at the sky, the millions of stars swimming around in his hazy vision, and tried to figure out where he was, and where he was going. He couldn't focus on anything besides the overwhelming pain of the gunshots that rested in his abdomen. The trees swirled around him, and every time he heard one of the Hanran firing a shot, it was like his entire body shook with fear. If anyone were to stumble upon him, he would simply be a whirling mess of emotions and too much blood dribbling down onto the floor. He was going to die. He didn't want to believe it, but all the signs were pointing toward it. He was going to bleed out, and Jun was going to have to bury him in a casket covered with a Japanese flag, while she suffered through the Militant Forces alone. He would never get to see his crazy father again, never hear how Ken'ichi rambled on about molecular science again, and he'd never see his mother's soft smile as she humoured his crazy theories. He'd never see Jun's smile again, never hear Minori's voice again. And the worst of all? They'd never get discharged after their duties were fulfilled and never get to escape the Hiyokuna to have their family in one of the dishevelled sectors. Suddenly, a light in the distance willed him to move forward. The familiar cherry-blossom littered path leading to his grey house welcomed him, and he could see the fairy lights swaying in the calm April breeze, while the sun set gracefully in the background. He could hear the charms his mother had littered the terrace with in a paranoid rush before he was born, and he could hear the oriental music pouring from the speakers as his mother danced through the kitchen while preparing dinner for him and Satoshi, because as a child he basically lived with the Nanami's. He could see his mother running out onto the terrace as he opened the garden gate, with a bloodied hand, and watch how her expression clouded over with concern. A distorted "Mamoru!" flitted through the air around him, and suddenly he was smiling. He felt arms embrace him, and looked up at his mother crying, her tears soft on his dirty cheeks. He let his gun fall to the side, and the hand he'd held to his stomach lilted next to his withering body. One last look at the eyes of his beloved mother, and then he fell.

It was not the eyes of his mother he looked into, after all, but Mamoru wouldn't know that until he woke from his trauma induced coma. It was the eyes of a panicked Naoki Kojima, who had no idea why a dying soldier had just collapsed on her dead front yard. In a panicked rush, she dashed inside, calling out for Kohaku, knowing she'd know how to fix this.

"Is that a mutant?" She asked with a golden eyebrow poised upward, but Naoki knew she was only half joking.

"He's dying, Kohaku." She stated gravely, and Kohaku's amber eyes came into focus.

"Help me drag him inside." She commanded as if she were an army general, and together the two scrawny girls dragged the dying soldier inside.

"Aya-chan!" Kohaku called out as soon as they had the soldier down in the middle of their dishevelled living room, "get my supplies!"

Ayano didn't answer, simply sprang into action, brining Kohaku's bag of medical supplies into the living room. Ayano gave Kohaku a warning glance as they heard one of the bedrooms opening.

"You deal with Takahashi, I'm busy." Kohaku dismissed her, as she pulled a pair of latex gloves over her graceful hands. She dug into the bag, removing a canister of alcohol from it and dumping her tweezers and scalpel into the mixture. Naoki watched the soldier's chest rise and fall, and it reassured her, knowing that at least he was still alive. Suddenly, she noticed something sticking out from one of his bloodstained pockets.

"Kohaku," she removed the small, metallic pencil-looking thing, "what's this?"

Kohaku looked like she had just been saved by some upper power as she grabbed the metallic object from Naoki's hand, "this is his saviour." She split it in half, and quickly started scrolling through the holographic display. She pulled something from the screen, and suddenly there was a canister of something Naoki had never seen.

"The only good thing about the heitai is the fact that they always carry healing sprays." She grabbed her tweezers, and started to pull out the bullets from his abdomen. The second one fell into a small metallic bowl with a soft cling, and then all hell broke loose.

"Nakamura Kohaku!" A voice thundered from upstairs, like the voice of God. It was, however, just a very pissed Akane Takahashi, "what do you think you're doing?" She demanded, a hand resting protectively on her protruding stomach.

"Akane-san, please, calm down. Stress is bad for the baby." Kohaku spoke softly, hoping to calm Akane down.

"Why is there a half dead soldier in my living room?" She demanded once more.

Kohaku seemed to ignore her, and spray the healing spray over his gaping stomach wound. Like magic, the wound started to close by itself, and all Kohaku had to do was place a couple stitches along the large wound to make sure it wouldn't split open.

"He was dying." Kohaku stated simply, "Nao-chan and I couldn't just leave him out there."

"You very well could," Akane scolded, "you of all people should be wary of what these people have done to us."

"I know you don't exactly like the heitai, Akane-san," Kohaku removed her bloody gloves, "but I took the oath when I left the Hiyokuna, I vowed to save all lives. It doesn't matter if," she gazed to his soiled jacket, and read the neatly sowed characters, "captain Nanami here is the devil incarnate. He was dying, and I had to save him."

Akane nibbled on her bottom lip, like she always did when she was dissatisfied, "clean up, please," she asked simply, "all this blood can't be good for a pregnant woman." With that, she turned around, and started waddling back up the stairs.

Kohaku exhaled, and looked at Naoki, with a sheepish grin decorating her vibrant features, "at least that's over." Naoki matched her relieved smile, laughing softly.

"Do you think he'll make it?" She dared to ask.

"Nao-chan," Kohaku said, with a confident smirk on her face, "I'm the best healer the Hiyokuna has to offer. He'll be fine."

"Okay," Naoki tore her gaze away from Kohaku's bright hair, and looked down at captain Nanami, "don't worry, Nanami-san, you're going to be just fine."

"Nanami-san?" Kohaku raised an eyebrow.

"It's on his coat," Naoki pointed to the neatly etched characters just above his collar bone, "I figured maybe, if he can hear me, he'd be more comfortable hearing his name."

Kohaku smiled, "you'd have been a great nurse, Nao-chan, if the world weren't so screwed up." She said, her smile going sad.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

update: dan's doing the graphics!!

too lazy to do the graphics since my internet's too slow, i'll fix it sometime lol

w love

dan <3