Warning: fluff, angst, sap, fighting, killing, etc.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

Summary: 11 of the 12 Shinsou, and all those that knew of Gurren and Masahiro had aplauded and helped out the child that had grown up too fast. Masahiro knows better than to possibly trigger something, so he smiled.

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Seiryuu was expecting the child to break.

"Gurren..." the child whispered.

"What? How do you know that name?" he had snapped back, "Someone like you... can't call me that name!"

He had expected the look of shock, and for a split second, he could have sword that he could hear the male's heart shattered.

But what Seiryuu had seen, and many others as well, was the child did not break down, and barely showed any signs of it, and instead, smiled.

"Ah, sorry, I had heard many stories about you from Grandpa, and he always referred to you as Gurren," he had laughed it off, a hand going to scratch his head sheepishly. "I didn't realize that you were touchy about it, and I guess the name stuck," he sighed. A short bow as bright (first time in a couple of weeks) brown eyes looked at the fire god, "Sorry."

The answer seemed to satisfy Gurren, who quickly turned away and reverted back to his Mononoke form.

"Whatever, just don't make that mistake again."

And with that, he left.

The silver-head shinsou kept his eyes on the kid, and like all others (who finally got over the initial surprise) were waiting for the male- the kid, to break.

Instead, he covered his eyes and laughed.

"Man, that was harder than it seemed," he said, his mouth still curving into a smile.

A silence was his answer.

"...Masahiro?" Kouchin had whispered softly.

By now, Genpu, Taiien, Kouchin, Rikugou, Seiryuu, and Byakko were in hearing distance. From the looks of it, Tenitsu and Suzaku were nearing in as well.

Wet, tear marks marred his face as the kid sniffed, but kept his smile.

"Ah, it's raining huh?"

"No, you're crying," Genpu replied, confused.

"No, it's raining," Masahiro whispered, his smile didn't waver as the tears came down a little faster as his hands clenched his eyes and head a little tighter, "Because I won't cry. If I cry, it might seem like I regret it."

A silence, as Seiryuu saw some rare emotions cross all eight of the Shinsou, as he had refused to look at the kid anymore.

"And I can't regret it."

But then again, this was no longer a kid.

"It looks like, somewhere along the line, we allowed Masahiro to grow up," Suzaku had attempted to laugh about with Seimei and Tenitsu, before he pinched the bridge of his nose in his right hand.

His back was near the wall, his right leg pulled up and his right hand pinching his nose, the proud warrior curling up into a half-ball as he clenched his left hand on top of his extended left leg.

Tenitsu was as his side, patting his right shoulder softly, trying her best to soothe someone in the area of problems she still had problems with.

"But no kid, no one, especially at that age," he croaked, "No one, should ever go through that. No one."

It was the rare times when Suzaku seemed as lost and as broken as he was when Tenitsu first died.

"Suzaku," Tenitsu whispered back.

"Is there... Isn't there, is there anything? Anything at all that could possibly revert this?" the red-haired asked, almost demanded.

The old, experience omnyouji looked up towards the clearing skies.

"How is he?" he had said instead.

"He's resting," Seiryuu took this as a chance to enter the room, "Akiko-hime, Yoshimaru, and Tsuyuki are looking after him right now." His voice seemed a lot more empty, now that the original Touda that he

hated on was mostly gone.

An empty, clueless thing, barely passing as a single, tiny fragment of what it was (and what it could have been).

"I see," Seimei rubbed at his chin.

"Seimei," Rikugou, who seemed to gain emotions at last, actually said something.

This was rare.

Then again, so was having all 12 Shinsou working for an human, and currently going to work for the human's grandchild.

"Is there... nothing we can do?"

His words were simple, a repeat of the mush of words Suzaku had put out before being ignored.

The silence was deafening.

"When Masahiro feels up to it, as his bodily functions are okay, he will go back to the Omnyou dorms," Seimei had continued.

"Seimei!" Kouchin had yelled.

"When that comes, Gurren will escort him in the day-time, if anyone else would like to go, go ahead. When Masahiro comes back and he wants to do his nightly patrols, you will all have to chose amongst yourself on who will go with him."

"Seimei?" Taiien's voice was breaking.

Something Suzaku and Genpu would have teased her with.

Abe no Seimei turned around, tired, dying eyes turning to the 11 Shinsous in the room.

(Gurren was probably walking around the manor.)

"Yes?"

"So... There is nothing we can do?" Byakko's voice, once soothing and calming, was slowly wavering.

When Seimei closed his eyes and looked away, all 12 Shikikami's knew the answer. They didn't like it, so they decided on another thing, one that Seimei (and nearly all of the Abe Household, and Akiko) had

already acted upon.

"Do what we can, for it may be all we could do," Tenku, had stated, "I think... that is for the best."

"And Touda?" Tenko had nearly snapped back, "What do we do with him?"

A pause as a slow sigh escaped Tenku, "Treat him as you please. But keep in mind that he is still one of the 12 Shinsou."

After a short game of rock, paper, scissors, Suzaku (who won with rock), happily made his way to Masahiro's room to tell him that he was going to be watching over him that night.

Then, upon reaching his destination, he heard a short laugh as Masahiro and Rikugou seemed to be enjoying a fairy tale of some sort.

"I wanna listen too!" Suzaku had proclaimed as he rushed into the room.

A quick glance at the white mononoke form in the corner, looking as passive as ever, and Suzaku narrowed his eyes.

But he tried, he really did, he didn't want to become someone like Seiryuu or anything (not that he had anything against the silver-haired shinsou). He didn't want to hate someone that just really, really

didn't know.

After all, all of them were the same, just until a couple of months ago.

"Huh? Oh, it's a story I ran into at the library," he said, pulling out a book of fairy tales. "Apparently, it's a collection of stories from the western side of the world."

Now this got Suzaku's attention as he turned away from the fire god and sat down next to Masahiro, who was sitting upright in his futon, opening the book to the first couple of pages.

"Apparently, there are some gods in this one too," he continued, his finger, and Suzaku notes the scars on it.

"Alright," he pushed all the thoughts away, "Read whatever story that's on page... 12," he said.

A surprised look as Masahiro flipped through the pages, "Ah! This is a really interesting story," he started.

His voice slowly fell into a combination of great narrations, and different pitches matching different characters when they spoke.

If anything, Suzaku hadn't enjoyed any written piece like this. Ever.

And from the way Rikugou had some small smiles every once in a while as well, the usually anti-social male seemed much more approachable than usual.

Meanwhile, Touda (since Gurren disappeared, and took Mokkun with him) seemed to relax further, and for one of the most shorter moments, Suzaku felt that Gurren was back.

But that was impossible.

Sadly enough, Masahiro understood that as well.

Just now though, just for the time being, Suzaku hoped that this would be enough, and someday, let these days be laughed upon.

Regret. Remorse.

And then, smile.