She had been melancholy for so long that she had become blind to the lives of the others around her. The whole world did not stand still just because one little stubble haired teen had holed herself up in her room for several weeks. Life went on whether or not she participated.

Slowly, slowly, her mother had been coaxing her back into the normal flow of life. Slowly, slowly, she was catching up on everything she had missed. Slowly, that is, until things started to hit her over the head, not too dissimilarly from a poisoned pop bottle to the back of the skull.

She hadn't realized, for example, that her friend Koga had also been spending time in bed lately. Or the fact that the reason he had to do so was because his arm had been amputated.

Katrina had practically choked on her ice cream when that topic of conversation had come up during the evening episode of Star Trek. The other students looked at her like she had to have been living under a rock not to have heard about that, but that was almost exactly what she had been doing the past few weeks. Suddenly ice cream and episodes didn't appeal to her in quite the same way they had just a few minutes ago.

A moment later, the young illusionist crept up the stairs. It wasn't like she was trying to be sneaky, just that she didn't want to wake anyone up that should be sleeping, especially if they needed all the energy they could get to heal. Outside of Koga's room, she knocked very gently on the door to see if he was still awake.

“Ryuichi,” she called softly through the door, “are you awake?” It was only about nine o'clock, but one never knew what time someone went to bed when they were confined to a sick bed.

Koga had went to war and lost. It was a vey short war; it made the Anglo-Zanzibar war look long. He supposed you could take into account the fact that it was more of a very dangerous scuffle…Where did that maniac get a knife from? Maybe it was his power to make knives appear out of thin air? Or maybe he could just cut people with out a knife…the scumbag hurt ghost and he wanted to hurt him back…so he was going to make sure he saw justice…but that ended very quickly, too quickly. He tried to knock out his foe and was disposed of for his trouble. After having his arm slashed open he was tossed into a dumpster…not the ideal, local for having a gaping wound. He attempted to get out but failed and that was all he really remembered before he woke up and agreed to what the good doctor had to tell him.

What he was told and overheard of the events however was a series of unfortunate events. Shin he assumed, the professor only said someone, Someone, got him the emergency room where an E.R. doctor, who“sanitized” the wound and then stitched him up…he had severed muscle and they treated it like it only needed a clean and a band-aid…while DocProf thought he was asleep he heard some speculation that the medic had been anti mutant and did a poor job on purpose, or was very, very, fresh out of school. It might have had to do with his muscles being very disagreeable as well, his muscles were set to constrict the whole time he was unconscious. Not only had the man sewn him up but when he cleaned the wound he neglected to remove some debris that was left over from the dumpster. So, needless to say DocProf decided to operate after the wound was to be found infected and mistreated, in the end amputation was deemed necessary, and approved by the boy before he was back under anesthesia, DocProf hated to do this to someone so young, but it was what had to happen if he was to limit the damage done, then it was the only choice.

Amazingly he didn’t really care at first, he wasn’t upset with the doctor, he was glad everyone he knew made it out ok. That was up until he realized all of the things he couldn’t do with only one hand.. His violin would never resonant beauty like it did in his hands again. Working a computer…playing video games…as if his eyes didn’t catch peoples attention enough….and so he rolled over and went back to sleep.

A few days went bay and he had only managed to sneak out once with Coldsteel’s help.
And even then the professor had a fit, so he laid in his bed on a heat pad and under house arrest or the closest that the doc could manage. He had grown board of listening to music already so he was just sitting figuring out what he could do versus what he would have to find new ways to do. It wasn’t so bad, he’d deal with I anyhow.

“Ryuichi,” “are you awake?

“Kat!” Koga leaped off of his excited as he’d been since before his encounter with that deviant. “I’m up!”

He ran to the door and flung it open with his right hand…in his excitement he had forgotten that he didn’t have a shirt on, the sleeve on his left arm had been bothering him as it went all the way down to where his arm ended. His arm would stand out more that way, but he did have his baggy pajama pants on so he was other wise decent. Since he had first met Katrina he had filled out quit a bit, training with Sam would do that to a guy, not to mention all the other physical activities he had gotten into, and he was finally hitting a good growth spurt too. If it wasn’t for his arm he might have planned for her to see him like this on accident. He stood there conflicted, should he hug her with one arm? Should her run and get his shirt? Should he play it nonchalant? Or?

“I’ve missed you.” Yup, he said the first thing that came to mind. “Haven’t seen you in a while.” He qualified. Wow! The pain killer that he was on for the surgery seemed to work wonders on his confidence level and letting his mouth lead him into admitting embarrassing stuff..

She heard him and heard the excitement in his voice. She was about to let herself in when Koga beat her to opening the door. Her eyes took him in all at once. His lack of shirt made his lack of arm painfully obvious. She winced at that as she looked over his wound. It seemed to be healing now, where it was sewn back up again, but it was still a sight. Slightly less obvious, but no less noticed, was his developing physique. He had muscles she never realized he had before. Either he had been working out or she had been completely oblivious... or both.

>>>“I’ve missed you... Haven’t seen you in a while.”

Did that warrant a hug? Yes, she decided, it did. She flung her arms (very carefully) around him and squeezed. He smelled like hospital. He was taller, too, and not very squishy. It must have been because of all the chest muscles.

“I missed you, too. Even though I haven't gone anywhere. It's been a rough summer, apparently for both of us.” She squeezed some more as if that would make him whole again.

“I'm sorry I wasn't here for you.” Her voice was quiet, and it squeaked just a little bit. She wasn't going to cry. She wasn't.

~~“I missed you, too. Even though I haven't gone anywhere. It's been a rough summer, apparently for both of us.”

“You weren’t gone?” He had gone by her room a bazillion times hadn’t he?

~~“I'm sorry I wasn't here for you.”

“No, not your fault at all.” he nodded to his left. “this will be ok, it’ll take some getting used to, but it will be ok.”He said it with a bit too much bravado, Who was he telling that himself or her? His right arm wrapped around her and squeezed her to him. A hug from Katrina was better than all the bed rest the Doc could command.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you, I thought you had left or went on vacation or, I must have terrible timing to have missed you every time.”

His back then straiten a bit as he reminded himself that he was topless and holding Kat to his chest. His mouth was suddenly extremely dry. He hadn’t seen the look on her face as she was so close and by the time he was far enough away from her, he was rushing to grab the closest shirt.


“Um, I should uh put a shirt on…” He pulled away slightly and hated it. “ You can come in if you like.” He waved his arm around his room and announced. “Château le Koga” It was spotless, he was normally a clean freak but with all the time and the world and a medical sentence to his room. It was perfection, there wasn’t even a bit of dust on the ceiling. He grabbed a tank top out of a drawer and flopped it over his head pulling it down with his arm and then he put the right arm threw after it was threw he pulled the shirt down and maneuvered his left threw the hole…was he embarrassed? Not really, it was awkward but not as much with her, she had already hugged him, obviously his amputated limb wasn’t pushing her away as he feared it might.

He was going to say something else but instead scooped her into another hug, he couldn’t not hug her when she looked on the brink of tears. “Shhhhh. Its ok. I promise. Everything will be ok.”

>>>“You weren’t gone?”

She shook her head, still clinging to him. She had been here all along, at least physically. She just hadn't been up for many visitors.

“No vacations. I just needed to be by myself for awhile. It seems silly now, that I was keeping everyone out.” That was about as much as she had admitted to anyone about what had happened to her. She could talk about the symptoms, but she still hadn't told anyone about the cause of the disease.

He pulled away, as if he had been shocked by something. Katrina instinctively stiffened and let go of him if he wanted to escape. Had she said something? No, he was heading for a shirt. She blushed. She hadn't meant to embarrass him or anything.

“Here, do you need help with that?” She stepped closer to try and assist, but he had it mostly figured out, even one handed. Katrina kind of tugged down at the bottom hem and helped to straighten it out, but he had managed it ninety-nine percent on his own.

He was already getting used to doing things with only one arm, and she hadn't even realized until today that he had gone through such a major change.

“I... I'm sorry. You seem to be managing fine.” She bit her lip. What kind of friend was she that she only was able to offer help after he didn't even need it anymore? She hung her head and kind of shrunk into herself.

>>>“Shhhhh. Its ok. I promise. Everything will be ok.”

And with that Koga scooped her into another hug. Katrina put her arms around him again. It felt safe, to be there encircled in his embrace. Even with only one arm, he could reach almost all the way around her shoulders. She had been so stupid. How could she have thought that locking everyone out could possibly be for the best? How she had even survived without anyone to hug her back to health, she couldn't even begin to guess. She was afraid that if he let her go again she would just fall apart again.

“Don't let go, okay?”

~~“No vacations. I just needed to be by myself for awhile. It seems silly now, that I was keeping everyone out.”

“oh, it happens.” What else could he say, she said she needed to be alone, and in the world of teenage mutants. “ Don’t worry about it.”

~~“Here, do you need help with that?”

“Tank topsss aren’t ssso bad.” Though it was subsequently the reason he was currently keeping his rooms thermostat set to bake.

~~“I... I'm sorry. You seem to be managing fine.”

“no, I don’t mind you helping,” did she just bit her lip, he was saying something wasn’t he? “itsss good that we’re here for each other.”

>>>“Shhhhh. Its ok. I promise. Everything will be ok.”

“Don't let go, okay?”

“I promissse, but, when I don’t and you are ready to leave, remember that you made me promissse. And I can’t let you go.” He smiled into her hair as he embraced her. it was platonic, but it felt amazing to be this close to Kat, not to mention that he really, really, needed a hug, It seemed like she needed one too. He wondered what she was thinking about…he was happy that she didn’t care about his arm. He had worried about it a great deal. He could stay right her the rest of his life and be perfectly happy…it was platonic?

The tank top didn't make much of a difference to how firm he felt when she pressed up against him; it was like snuggling a brick wall with a thin piece of cotton in between. Except more comfortable than a brick wall, because he was not a scratchy texture and didn't have perfectly rectangle shaped protrusions with hard edges. Just her somewhat soft flesh against his somewhat firm flesh, and they fit together quite comfortably. She caught herself wondering if hugging him like this was still okay. They were friends, right? So hugging was allowed. This was Koga, just as he had always been, minus a limb but still the same person fundamentally. With muscles.

She shifted her weight slightly so she could look up at his face. It was very close to her own face. He had a nice nose, nice lips, too now that she could see them up close. Some girls would die to have lips like that. They were soft looking, not too thin or too full. And very very close. Err...

"What... what happened to you? If you don't mind telling it, that is," she would understand perfectly if he didn't want to share his experiences. Some things were just too hard to talk about.

Her skin was exquisite, her head on his chest was…right. She wanted him to hold her indefinitely, she tilted her chin up to him, her breath was a soft breeze of warmth near his mouth. She was staring at his lips she was so close and her perfect grey eyes were studying his lips. His black eyes studied every aspect of the girl that he had so pointedly missed over the last month or two. Their faces were already close, a slight shift brought them that much closer he wanted to kiss her so badly…how would she react. Would this be her first kiss as well? His shoulders and arms cropped up with goose bumps. His lips parted ever so slightly like you were supposed to. At least in every romantic comedy he ever watched…was he doing it right? Should he even be doing it? Did she want him to? And like a semi hitting the breaks so a row of momma ducks and ducklings could cross a busy road.

~~"What... what happened to you? If you don't mind telling it, that is,"

Katrina hit the breaks on his slight motion with a simple inquisitive sentence…would she still stay close or maybe even respond to his action instead of waiting to hear what he would say?…did she notice? Was she avoiding it, was she oblivious, did she feel the same. Unanswerable questions bounded and rebounded in the logical youth’s mind. His mind then registered the question at hand.

“oh, thisss?” he asked as if she had noticed a scrap on his knee, he moved his amputated limb a little. “well, itsss a long ssstory…actually it’s a ssshort ssstory. Sssome psssycho went crazy and attacked Ghossst. Aurum, I think that’sss hisss name, one of the coffee guys at full circle wasss there and called the ssstore, ssshin and I went and tried to help. Ghossst looked like ssshe wasss a goner… Ssshin put a wall between the crazy and every one elssse, aurum and I were going to ghossst out of there and sssome help, and a unicorn came and healed her…it wasss amazing ssshe looked like a goner and jussst like that ssshe wasss alive. For what ever reassson sssomething sssnapped in me, thinking about sssomeone being so carelessss with a perssson’s life. Not to mention all the havoc this guy caused all over the place. I couldn’t let him get away with it. I will never forget hisss face. I climbed the wall tackled him and tried to knock him out. I can conssstrict.” He mentioned casually, “but out of nowhere the guy had a knife and cut through a lot of my arm…after that he tossssed me in a dumpssster…from there Ssshin ssscared the guy off and tried to get me to a hossspital. The guy at the hospital ssscrewed up and didn’t clean my arm enough and stitched it up infected. Docprof sssaid the only thing we could do to sssave sssome of it was ampputate.” He shrugged. “ I wisssh I could find that unicorn, I bet he’d be able to fix it. until then I’m down a limb.” He shrugged again as if it didn’t matter all that much. “Hmmm wasss that long or ssshort?.”

He managed to not concentrate on the lack of space between them for about a minute or two but the second his vocal cords stopped strumming he was again completely aware of her proximity. Somewhere his mind notified him that the door was open and he was glad of it. he wasn’t having any unbecoming thoughts of Katrina, his intentions were pure, but it helped that if somehow someone was to notice the closeness of the moment it would be obvious that it wasn’t to exceed a certain level of fondness for one another.

Depth perception doesn't always work when something is very close to a person's face. It almost seemed to Katrina like Koga's face was getting slightly closer to her. That wasn't possible, there was hardly any space left between them for his face to go. She thought it must have been a trick of her imagination. Once he started telling his story his face returned to its normal place. Katrina wondered if he could make himself look like a magic eye puzzle. His skin was about the right distance away at the moment.

The blonde teen was snapped back from her reveries by Koga's words. She stiffened in his arms, a surprised reaction to hearing the shocking bits of the story, but she didn't pull away. Someone attacked Ghost? And she was saved by... a unicorn? A unicorn that had disappeared as mysteriously as it had appeared.

“I think I know someone else that could heal you, too. He healed me after...” She looked down, studying the thread pattern that made up the fabric of his shirt. she didn't know how to finish that sentence without the whole story spilling out just as Koga's had done. She let the sentence hang unfinished rather than having to remember what happened.

She found Koga's eyes again and the lightest possible grey contemplated the darkest of blacks. “I'm pretty sure Slate can heal anything.” Maybe even amputated limbs. Maybe.

His hand stroked her back as she stiffened, he thought initially it was due to the fact that his story was terrible, but there was more to it then that, he could see it in her eyes. He hugged her a bit tighter.

~~“I think I know someone else that could heal you, too. He healed me after...” “I'm pretty sure Slate can heal anything.”


Koga couldn’t help the look that flashed across his face at the mention of Katrina needing to be healed, he wouldn’t ask right now, he could tell he shouldn’t there was too much pain there. Maybe he inquires it of slate he didn’t need to know any other detail, other than whom. There would be hell to pay, he didn’t care who or what, someone was going to weep for what they had done. Wail for their sins. That pain and reaction wasn’t meant for her. The repercussions would be epic.

The look softened from vengeance to sympathy and nurturing, his eyes once again took her in, he swallowed slightly.


“Katrina.” He paused deciding what was going to come after that, His heart speed as the thought crossed his mind. He broke his promise to never let go. His five fingers found the edge of her chin and nudged it up slightly, ever so gently, he leaned in the million miles contained in the inches between them and his lips found hers, he planted a gently kiss, that requested the right to be there, but he didn’t flee for terror either, if she kissed him back , he just might try to kiss her more.

The look on his face when she said she'd been in need of healing was hard to read from this close. It almost looked angry, but not at her. He looked into her eyes with his own bottomless inky pools and his expression softened. It was more one that promised protection than anything else. All he said was her name, but that one word spoke volumes. He said it so gently that it calmed her even from the memories of the nightmares that had started to creep into the edges of her thoughts. She was safe here in his embrace, she needn't worry about anyone anymore because he would be here. Had anyone ever said her name like that before?

His hand came up to her chin, leaving her back strangely cool where his arm no longer encircled it. He leaned forward and touched his lips gently against hers. She froze, half surprised by what had happened and the other half surprised that his lips were so soft against her own. He was kissing her and she was letting him and by the time the idea of that had caught up to her she had been standing there long enough that it probably counted as kissing back.

Katrina stepped back, and suddenly her own feet became very interesting to look at, “I... umm...”

She hadn't worn socks today, apparently. She never really liked socks. The seam on the toe always bothered her. Her face felt hot, but her toes were nice and cool. Good temperature control, bare feet were.

Perfection, her lips were everything good in the world. Her lips initially responded ever so slightly at first…you know the first millisecond the second and third he moved his a little bit, by the forth she hadn’t responded, and he opened his eyes again. Her own grey orbs were wide open! And she took a step back.

fail

~~“I... umm...”

“didn’t sssee that coming?” he attempted to finish her sentence.

damn it!….don’t let go….staring at his lips…pressing her head to his chest…how had he read that wrong? Girls were confusing. He wanted her back against his chest in a comfortable embrace….would he be able to get that back. Had he ruined their friendship…should he have asked… would she run away? Would she still introduce him to her healer friend? Did it even matter? What if something like that had happened to her….

“Kat, I’m so sssorry, I sssshould have made sssure, it wasss ok, I jussst thought.”His heart was pounding… so much won in moments and squandered the next.“That maybe. I dunno.”

His eyes scanned her, inquisitively. “are you ok? I won’t do that ever again, unlessss you asssk me to.”
She couldn’t get past um, and he couldn’t shut up. He hoped she could meet his eyes again, he was so concerned with her, he hadn’t been shocked enough to be embarrassed. His hand did how ever comb through his hair. He had already kissed her, and he had risked their comfortable easy friendship, he might as well go the rest of the distance. “ Its just I think you are amazing. Because you are…’ his mouth finally ran dry of words.

He had kissed her. And she...

>>>“didn’t sssee that coming?”

That was fairly accurate, actually. Her toes wiggled uncomfortably against the floor. It wasn't that he hadn't been obvious, it was that she had been incredibly dense. She hadn't been expecting him to kiss her because... well, because no one ever had before.

He had kissed her. And now he was apologizing for it.

“You don't have to apologize. I'm okay. I think you...” She tried to keep up with his string of hurried words. Wait, he thought she was amazing?

Well, he had kissed her. Maybe she should have seen that coming, too.

“I...” She was so eloquent today. “I was just surprised. It wasn't bad. I mean...” she wasn't actually sure what she meant. She was still rather flustered. She wrapped her arms around herself.

“You let go.”

~~“You don't have to apologize. I'm okay. I think you...”

"oh." Well that was good sign, it wasn't so bad he needed to apologize and she wasn't running.

~~“I...” “I was just surprised. It wasn't bad. I mean...”

"oh." It wasn't bad! he still said he'd wait for her to ask him...should he ask if he should wait for her to ask?

~~“You let go.”

"Oh." he stepped forward and encircled her again in his arm...he waited to make sure that she wasn't going to run or didn't want to be near him..

"If my other arm wasn't on vacation, I would have kept an arm around you...while I moved your chin." yeah that wasn't going to, remind her of the awkwardness.

"Katrina?" her name as a question wasn't the kind that came with lip smacking declarations. What was he going to say next? He had no Idea. He wanted to say a lot. he wanted to say nothing. "I think that you might have to do some of the holding too. I'm jussst sssaying, if we are going to hold each other forever."

Ryuichi's toes appeared in front of her toes and he hugged her again. He was right, it was hardly fair to expect him to be able to do two things at once with only one hand, nor was it fair to expect him to do all the hugging. The little illusionist untangled her arms from where they were pinned between her chest and his and snaked them around his middle.

She still wasn't sure how she was supposed to act. This wasn't how it worked out in the movies and she had no idea what it was supposed to be like in real life. So she just hugged him back, eyes closed, face pressed into his shirt.

She felt like she had ruined things by not kissing back like she was supposed to. She had been so surprised she had done exactly the wrong thing. If she could rewind things and do it all over again, what would she have done? It was all up to her now, if she ever wanted a second kiss she had to ask for it herself. Did she want a second kiss? Ryuichi was a good friend and she liked him a lot. He was handsome and kind and gentle and a good friend, but did she like-like him?

He obviously like-liked her. But so did Fausto, he'd said so on Valentine's Day. And Ryuichi had given her a valentine, too. And he had so gallantly stepped aside to let her talk to Fausto. Had the lizard boy liked her even back then? This was all so confusing. She had never had anyone like her before and now there seemed to be two boys who did. And she wasn't sure how to react to either of them. In the movies it was so obvious who the heroine should pick; the right match was so obvious. Katrina knew how to love, but when it came to being in love she had no clue what it was supposed to feel like.

She took out all her confusion on Ryuichi's poor ribs.