TWO YEARS LATER
John's POV:
I smiled as I walked up to Lin, and he put a hand on my shoulder.
Dr Yumimura exited the room I had been visiting of late to deal with my memories and pain.
I have Naru to thank for helping me find and pay for him.
I smiled, and politely bowed.
"Thank you." I smiled, and Dr Yumimura nodded.
"You don't need any more help; as far as I can tell, since you have so many people backing you, you should be alright. However, I want you to take things easy, and your brother forgot his puffs yesterday – again." he held out the small, blue container, and I thanked him, putting the container in my pocket. "However, should you feel the need – which I doubt you shall – my door will always be open."
Having been petrified for so long, it turns out James has to sometimes take puffs and tiny amounts of muscle relaxant for helping his system keep up, although he's steadily getting back into shape – with enough exercise, that is (thanks, again, to Naru).
We left for the car, where James was waiting.
"How did it go?" James asked.
"I don't have to go to the sessions anymore, like you." I smiled, and James quickly shot out, wrapping his arms around me.
"Naru will want us back at base to report. Gene and Yasu are at it again, though." Lin replied.
Lin's become more comfortable around us after that ordeal – maybe because he finally revealed his darkest secret.
As did I.
We entered base, to find its common chaos.
Gene and Yasu had recently been attempting "randomly" (Lin and Naru secretly figured out it followed a well-blended concept of n times Fibonacci times the root of n, along with n being the day plus month and year of their last attempt) to make Naru and Mai finally admit they like each other.
"It's their nineteenth this time…" Lin mused, walking into his room.
We heard a yell, and a moment later, Yasu was kicked out of Lin's office.
"Ow! I was only borrowing his inbox! It's not like I can download Thunderbird Mail myself to get into his user! Windows won't even allow me to open its package!" Yasu called.
"Invasion of Privacy!" Lin's yell could well be heard yelling back, also there was the hint of a smirk in his tone.
"Got it?" Gene asked from behind a cup of Lemon-grass tea.
"Yes." Yasu replied with a grin, holding up a small piece of paper.
"Isn't that a bit much?" I asked, sweat-dropping.
"All it is is Naru's IP address and Mai's IP address. It was in the depths of Lin's database – probably in case of bugs…"
"Such as the one we sent last time?" Gene grinned.
"What?!" I exclaimed, paling.
"What's an IP address? And how can bugs damage a computer?" James asked, confused.
"An IP address gives you the official name of a computer, and if a hacker, or in their case cracker, knows it, they're able to take control – that's why you should always back things up." Lin said, snatching the piece of paper and turning it to ash in a millisecond. "Nice try, but I have a hidden log to check on people like you."
"But I'm too genteel to be a cracker, and you know it." Yasu smirked.
"You're dancing on a fine line." Lin sighed, before smirking and re-entering his office.
"Where re the others?" I asked.
"Madoka's doing further research on Demons and Angels, while Monk and Ayako are on yet another date." Gene replied. "Mai's in the kitchen… Should we start making them a helpful list of baby names?"
"Not just yet." Yasu replied.
Yasu gave a cheeky grin, and the disastrous duo went to his desk, where Yasu typed something in at high speed, before there was the resound sound of the enter button, and Gene smirked.
"We'll see." Gene grinned…
…
…
…
…
"EUGENE! YASUHARA!"
Joker: Damn… I ran out…
Naru: What did they do?
Mai: *growls * They changed our backgrounds to pictures from the holiday we dragged you on last year.
Naru: *immediately gains creepy aura* I wonder how well Gene remembers the paper-folder punishment…
Gene: *gulps* Triple R... Joker, you won't be so cruel to us in the sequel?! I don't want to be paper-foldered!
Joker: Ano~... I think you'll have a bit more to deal with - but you do get to have extra-cute scenes with your brother! Also... *w* (hehe~) you get your own cute scenes!
Gene: Really? *gains starry-eyes, before realising fault and shaking head* WHAT ABOUT-!
Joker: *pours another cup of tea for Mai and Naru about a meter away as they sit at a small, round coffee-table*
Mai: So what's the paper-folder-punishment?
Naru: *sips tea while reading a book with his usual face* I merely open a file so its contents falls everywhere, have him pick up the contents, before whamming the left-over container onto the rear of Gene's head. Either that or I merely back-hand him to insure I leave a mark to prove my point.
Gene: Meany! TT~TT *uses cute, chibi-annoyed face on us*
Mai: I see... *sweat-drops*
Joker: ANYWAY! I wanna thank ALL m'followers and give them ALL cookies! Also, M'sequel's called "Within a Village" and I'll have that up in a bit, seeing as I've already written some of the chapters.
Again, thank you ALL SO MUCH for reading, hope you ended this with a BIG grin on your face and you've been able to deal with my off-hand speeding and publishing the last handful of chapters in one go!
Sign-off for now, and hope you join me after your amazing life in my Tea Party in Hell,
- JoKeR