Chapter 26

He stood standing nervously in the doorway for several minutes. He hadn't been back to this place for awhile and wasn't sure what the reception would be like. He forced himself to take in a deep breath of crisp morning air. Everything was so clean and quiet, almost like what his home for the past months had been.

"Are you going to come in or are you going to continue to block the way, Shotaro?" A firm, yet gentle female voice asked as she carried a tea set to her office.

"Oka-san? You saw me here?" How did she see him? He thought he had hidden himself better than that. He'd been trained for god's sake. What would happen if other humans could see him?

She smiled knowingly. "Come join me for tea before breakfast. Or…have you already eaten?" She asked then shook her head. "No, of course you have."

He furrowed his brow and followed her to her office. He honestly didn't realize how much he'd actually missed his family, but the prospect of actually losing them to this and never seeing them again, brought forward the longing for his family. His mother specifically. Even if he hadn't been close to his father, his mother was his. She was the example he always thought of when it came to the pinnacle of womanhood. She was strong, gentle, stern, kind, yet she was humble and modest.

He reached out, grabbed her and wrapped her in a strong hug. "I missed you so much. Thank you for taking care of me and being so patient with me." He mumbled into her shoulder. "I love you, Mama."

His parents sat in front of him, completely stunned. They had no idea things had gotten to this point. His father honestly didn't know what to say about the entire situation.

"We'll go with you, {Baby Boy}. There is no world without you, Kuon." Juli told him in tears as she wrapped him in her arms. "If you say it's this way, I'm willing to go."

Kuu pulled his wife and son into his arms and agreed. "We will not make the mistake of not going with you this time, Kuon."

Kuon sighed in relief. "Isn't this going to affect your careers?" He asked a little worried. They had always put that first. It was what he worried about the most when coming to them.

"I refuse to leave this life for work." Juli told him as she pulled away. "Where will we be going?"

Kuon shook his head. "Sorry. I won't be able to tell you for security reasons. Too many lives are at stake for something like that." He warned.

"When do we leave?" Kuu asked just out of curiosity. No, he wasn't going to let anyone know they were leaving. Considering what Kuon had told them, they probably wouldn't have been allowed to and Kuon would probably be taken into custody. Kuu and Juli were fully aware of how they were rounding up families and putting them in "quarantine". However, they were not revealing that these people were crypto-humans, and they certainly weren't divulging the little tidbit that the majority of those compounds were being raided and emptied regularly by Kyoko and her supporters.

"We can leave whenever you're ready." Of course they could. He had excelled at Kitsune magic. Making a portal was nothing to him. Kotetsu told him that Kyoko had excelled at Fairy magic. Which was appropriate in his mind. To him, she did look like a fairy. At least when she visited him in his dreams or was he the one that did the visiting. He wasn't so sure anymore.

"I'm sorry… I had to do it to protect you. A Dhampir would never survive and neither would a human." She confessed in tears.

"Y-You didn't turn Dad?" Sho asked with furrowed brow.

She sighed sadly and shook her head. "Only Dhampir can be turned Shotaro. A human has to have a vampire bloodline in order to turn without dying. It would have killed him." She explained.

Oh, there was so much that he didn't know. So much that the legends and books either didn't know or got completely wrong.

"Will you just come with me? Otou-san can go with us." He coaxed.

She was hesitant. She wasn't sure if her better half would be willing to go and she didn't wish to leave him behind.

"Mama, they've been killing the humans that our kind are with along with us." He plead with her. "If you stay… So will I." He confessed. He didn't want to lose what little family he had left. He had burned a lot of bridges in his life. This was one that he would not destroy. He was determined.

"I cannot allow you to take that risk. You have too many that rely on you now, Shotaro." She told him.

"We will go." A stern male voice announced as the elder of the Fuwa males entered unannounced. He gave his wife a soft look and caressed her cheek. "I've known for years, Koi."

Sho had to admit that he was a little envious of the scene now. If one were to say that he wouldn't have been nauseated by the little display six months ago, he would have punched them in the face. He smiled softly, hoping deep down that some day he would find the one to match him.

When all was said and done, there really weren't that many that had human families or that had families that were outside the shelters and compounds. The elves and fairies had their own means of dealing with the situation. Their communities had been hidden and protected from humanity from the very beginning. They had never actually trusted the humans. Yes, there were a few here and there that communed with them and actually decided to mingle with them; however, those that did didn't bring them back to their hidden lands.

There were other communities that chose to go to the shelters specifically with their own kind. Those that would normally be harmful to others sheltered together, such as those that gathered in packs, vampires, and shades.

It wasn't long before scientists began testing to authenticate an individual's humanity and there were many natural humans that took offense to it. They divided into factions: those that believe in and supported the crypto-humans, and those that feared and hated them. The line was being drawn in the sand and Kyoko and her people could not leave the humans that supported them to fight alone. Not when they were trying so hard to protect and befriend them. So, many volunteered to lend a hand to their supporters and that's when it all started to snowball into something that would change the fate of Earth and put pure humans on the brink of extinction.