So, I did my damndest with that last chapter and I tried to put Hikari in as much pain as possible without making it seem mean-spirited, hence all the comfort talk. Now, we get to see the parental perspective, and wherever that path should take us. Cheers.

Koji Takanashi sat where he always did in the first hour or so after his girls went off to school. The rightmost edge of the green couch, freshly brewed coffee in his hand, daily paper on his lap. He was a creature of habit, and he loved this part of his routine especially. It was a tranquil moment, free from the chaos of the morning, yet simultaneously void of the hectic preparations that he would have to start making for the rest of the day. It was the little things that he had to do that made his day more work than that of the average stay-at-home parent. When one of your daughters was a vampire, your family learned to live with a few…extra chores that other families didn't. For example, once Koji got up from the couch, he had to check that the internal temperature of the house was 70 degrees Fahrenheit or lower, to keep it nice and cool for Hikari. He also had to check the special blinds he had installed in Hikari's room, designed to repel and block UV rays but still not ruin the window's view, to make sure they were still secure. It would be no good if Hikari got sunburnt just by sitting in her room. He wasn't the only one who had small duties to perform, however. Midori was in charge of keeping tomato juice stocked in the fridge and Himari was responsible for making sure that when Hikari's fangs started to itch, she had an arm to chew on. There were others, certainly, but it did Koji no good to think of them all. They were small things, and everyone was always happy to pitch in if it meant helping Hikari. She was nothing more than a constant smile, and that positive energy tended to infect the family.

As he was walking away from a thermostat set to a nice 69 degrees, he heard his phone ringing and went to grab it off the kitchen counter.

"Hello?" Koji asked, seeing from the caller ID that it was the high school. He smiled when Takahashi spoke on the other end of the line.

"Mr. Takanashi," Takahashi said, sounding as if he were running and out of breath, "I have some bad news for you that, you may want to sit down for."

"I'm listening." Koji said, his smile dropping from his face and his voice growing serious. Over the next 30 seconds he listened to the most painful phone call he had never hoped to receive.

"I…I understand." He said. "We'll be there as soon as we can."

"I'm so-" Takahashi began, but Koji hung up before he could say another word. He speed-dialed Midori. Takahashi said that Hikari had been hurt very badly. Very, very badly. He wanted to throw up and cry, but right now his daughter needed him. However, he also knew his wife might not take the news so quickly, and Takahashi made it very clear that time was of the essence. If Koji told her that Hikari had been hurt, she would ask questions. There was only one sure-fire way to make sure Midori left from work this second. The phone rung three times before she picked.

"Hel-" She started, but was cut off by the panicked voice of her husband.

"Bat troubles at school. We need to get there, now!" Koji said quickly and firmly. She needed all of two seconds to process that and give her reply.

"I'm already on my way." She said, hanging up. She knew how serious bat troubles at school could be. It had only been used just a few times over the years, and one of those times was the day that Himari and Hikari had made their promise to each other.

The Takanashi family only had one car and, as such, his wife naturally laid claim to it as it got her to and from work. That left Koji with his bike. It was far slower than anything motorized, sure, but when his kids were in trouble and needed help…when his daughter had been hurt, that thing could move like the wind. He knew he and his wife would be coming into the school from the same direction. Their house lay somewhat equidistant from her work and the high school. However, he reasoned that, with the extra few miles his wife had to travel, and the potential of traffic, they should be getting there at the same time. He pumped his legs harder and faster as he crested the hill that the girls' school lay on. Behind him he heard a running car fast approaching and, much to his relief, it was indeed his wife. She honked him once and he signaled for her to keep going ahead, when he saw two people running down the road towards him. If he saw right, then one of them was…

"Himari!" Koji yelled. His wife pulled up alongside him, turned her car off, and hopped out as fast as she could.

"Mom! Dad!" Himari yelled, waving her arms and running towards them. Behind her Koji could make out another. He believed that was Satou-sensei, the new demi teacher at the school.

Koji and Midori practically raced to get to their daughter, and the three collided in a tight embrace. Only when Himari's arms were around him did Koji feel something wet and sticky coming from her hands. They were dripping with blood, though some of it had already dried near her wrists.

"Jesus, Himari!" He said in a panic. "You're bleeding! What happened to you? Are you…" He was cut off by a sickening sentence.

"It's not mine." Himari said, starting to cry uncontrollably. "It's n-not…mine!"

Then, Koji remembered why they were here in the first place. He remembered what Takahashi had said.

"Oh, God!" He said, bowing his head. "Sweetie, where is Hikari? Where's your sister?" He asked, tears forming in his eyes. Himari lifted a finger to point behind her, where he could see the unmistakable flashes of siren lights.

"No…" he said in a near whisper. Then, in the blink of an eye, he was bolting towards them. Over his shoulder, he could hear his wife yelling, but he would stop for nothing.

"Wait!" Midori yelled, trying to get her husband's attention. "Where are you going?!" He didn't look back. "I thought he said it was just bat troubles." She thought to herself. "THIS ISN'T JUST BAT TROUBLES!" She cleared her thoughts and turned back to Himari. They had two daughters and she wasn't going to let Himari feel neglected.

"Baby, are you okay?" She asked with the kind of caring tone that only a mother can have.

"H-Hikari…" She said between sobs.

"Typical Himari." Midori thought with a very small smile. "Always more worried about others than herself."

"What happened to her?" Midori questioned furthered.

"B-bad people…attacked h-her." Himari said, trying her best to speak coherently despite all that she was feeling. Midori's face went dark, and her stomach did more than one cartwheel. She thought she was going to be sick, or worse. People had attacked her daughter. People had intentionally hurt her child. What made it worse was that the blood on Himari's hands was clearly Hikari's. She knew Hikari's personality. She knew how nice her daughter always was to everyone she met, which meant she also knew…she also knew why they had attacked her, whoever they were. There was only one logical explanation. Her daughter had been attacked for being a vampire. The realization only made her feel sicker and she joined Himari in tears.

"C'mon, baby! Get in the car!" She commanded, helping Himari in her feet and hurrying her towards the back seat. One they were both inside, she started the car up and drove them both up to where the main commotion was happening. She did not like what she saw. She was just in time to see what Koji was seeing. Their daughter being lifted onto a stretcher and loaded into the back of the ambulance, which promptly took off, speeding down the road.

Midori jumped out and so did Himari, who yelled for her teacher when she saw him.

"Takahashi sensei!" She cried, getting his attention. She also got her father's attention, who joined back up with his family. Koji spoke first when they reached Takahashi.

"What the hell happened to our daughter?!" He shouted, his voice full of pain and rage.

"There's no time to explain right now!" Takahashi said in a rush. "She was in that ambulance and my best guess is that she'll end up at Shibasaki General Hospital. Now we need to get going if we're gonna keep pace with her!" He finished.

"We?" Koji asked, a touch of venom in his voice. "What do you mean, "we"?"

"I mean that I was there, I saw what happened to her. I may be able to help fill in the doctors on what's causing her symptoms." He replied quickly.

"Alright. Fine, let's get moving." Koji agreed, as all four raced back to the car and piled in. The drive to the hospital was a fast, but lively one. Himari mustered the last reservoirs of strength she had left in her and swallowed her tears for the time being, working with Takahashi to tell Koji and Midori what happened to their other daughter. It was a very unpleasant ride. When they pulled up to the emergency room entrance, they saw that Hikari's ambulance had already been parked just in front of the doors and unloaded. They had beaten the family there by a good few minutes, it seemed.

"That's good." Koji thought.

They rushed inside to the receptionist who was just finishing a call.

"Our daughter was just brought in, how do we get to her?! Where is she?!" He said, his voice raising.

"Is your daughter Hikari Takanashi?" The receptionist asked calmly.

"Yes! Now let us see her!" Koji pressed.

"Sir, you need to calm down. I understand how scared you are, but you can't possibly see her right now, or anytime soon for that matter. They brought her into ICU the second she got here." The receptionist said.

"…what?" Koji asked in a near whisper, his voice having been taken out form under him by the devastating news. "…what does that mean?"

"It means that they managed to stabilize her in transit, but by the time they had gotten to her, the damage to her respiratory system was…severe. We can't guarantee that she'll pull through, let alone make a full recovery, but they're doing all they can for her. I'm sorry, but that's all I can tell you." She said somberly.

At that, each member of the family broke down, their world having just been shattered. Koji managed to pull his girls over to the waiting room chairs, where they all sat down together and held each other tightly, each of them shedding their fair share of tears. The hours dragged on, and it felt like they had been waiting for days but, eventually, a man came out into the waiting room. By the looks of him, a surgeon. Koji stood up promptly to greet him, praying that he bore good news.

"Are you her parents?" He asked, his surgical mask covering his expression and muffling his voice.

"Yes." Koji replied quickly, Midori standing up to be by his side.

"Please tell us our daughter is okay…" Midori pleaded. At that, the surgeon pulled down his mask to reveal…a smile. The smile turned to a soft chuckle and only then did he speak.

"Well, she's stabilized, albeit still in critical condition." He said quietly from exhaustion, though clearly full of happiness and personal pride. "She's a fighter, that one. She should pull through just fine."

Once more, the ladies in the family broke down crying, albeit this time, they could not be mistaken for anything other than tears of joy. Koji ran over to shake the surgeon's hand, who quickly pulled off a slightly bloodied latex glove so as to receive the shake.

"Thank you, sir. Thank you, thank you, thank you!" He exclaimed.

"Oh, don't thank me." The surgeon said, shutting him down. Koji looked confused. "We were very lucky to get her when we did. Even a few minutes later, and she would have been beyond our help. I said that she was a fighter, but it seems there were others fighting for her too. The paramedics reported that, when they got to her, it looked like people had been working on her for a few minutes. I'm not sure what they did, but I like to believe that, had she not received that first aid, she wouldn't be alive right now." The doctor finished.

"Then we have Himari here to praise." Takahashi said, breaking the silence he had maintained since getting in the car back at the school, and resting his hand on Himari's shoulder. "I left her with Hikari when I went to go find help. She administered aid to her sister the longest, a good few minutes." Takahashi beamed down. Himari blushed but smiled.

"Well then you should be commended, kid." The doctor said, kneeling down to her eye level. "You may very well be the reason your sister is still alive. She's very lucky to have you."

Nobody knew it, but Himari couldn't be happier at those words. She had done her job. She had helped her sister. She had even saved her life! Hikari was going to be okay.

"Now, sir, you said that you went to go find help?" The doctor asked, addressing Takahashi.

"Yes, I did." He replied.

"Does that mean that you were there when, whatever happened to the patient happened?" The doctor asked. "We had to treat her for severe respiratory damage. Asphyxiation had set in when we got her and that's what nearly did her in. Her throat was swollen shut, among other things. We had to perform a tracheostomy. It's a minimally invasive surgery where we cut open a hole into her throat, so that she can start breathing again, but don't worry, I imagine that she won't need it for long and the hole will either naturally heal shut, or we will force it shut through more surgery. All she'll have after she leaves the hospital is a cool scar, and an interesting story. Now, we see that she's a vampire, so I'm assuming a severe allergic reaction or some sort of lachrymatory? Her senses would get hit far harder than a normal human's." The doctor surveyed the group in front of him, hoping for an answer. Takahashi offered one.

"It was pepper spray. Several blasts, straight to the face." He said quietly.

"Yeah. Yeah, that would do it." The doctor said. "We figured as much, but the treatment wouldn't have been any different if it had been some other cause. We were really just operating on the throat. Now, I won't ask how that happened, I'm sure it's best left for the police."

"Speaking of the police, did they ever catch who did this. Are they going to?" Midori asked, turning towards Takahashi.

"No, not yet. But the school security guards will be able to tell the story to the police. They were there when it happened." Takahashi said.

"Wait, there were guards there when my daughter was attacked?! Didn't they help?! Did they just stand there and watch?!" Koji asked, growing angrier by the second. He wasn't there to protect his kid, but the fact that someone else had been there and did nothing was just as bad.

"They couldn't have helped, Mr. Takanashi!" Takahashi said, shutting him down. "They're just high school security. They legally can't act unless someone else initiates violence. That violence was initiated when Hikari was attacked. But, for what it's worth, they did leap into action then and tased as many of the thugs as they could."

"Sorry to interrupt, but if your daughter was the victim of an attack, then the police will be here eventually to question her and all of you. Their pretty frequent visitors of the ER." The doctor said grimly.

"Wasn't just an attack. It was a hate attack. The "Anti-Demi-Humans" are the ones that did this to her. All because she's a vampire." Takahashi said, grimacing.

"I feared as much." The doctor sighed. "We've had reports of other vampires all across the country coming in just as injured and beat up as she was. I just hope those bastards get what's coming to them soon. But, enough of that, time for some good news." He drew all eyes onto him when he said that. "You can all come see her." They all got very excited. If Koji and Midori were being honest with themselves, they wouldn't start feeling better until they saw Hikari, despite hearing that she was going to make it.

"However," the doctor said, "you can only see her. Like I said, we just finished surgery on her, and we were only recently able to stabilize her condition. She's not ready for any visitors, so you'll have to stay outside the room."

"That's fine!" We'll take it, we just want to see her" Koji said with immense relief.

"Follow me." The doctor said with a warm smile, and into the hospital he led them.

When they reached Hikari's room, Himari was able to see in through the observation window. She saw her sister there, sleeping on a hospital bed. She was hooked up to a bunch of tubes and machines that Himari didn't know, and there was one blue tube going right into her throat. It was kind of creepy, but she knew it was helping Hikari get better, so that was good. The doctor addressed the group one final time.

"I highly recommend you all go into the waiting room. By the time she wakes up, she should be able to have visitors, and I imagine she'll want to see you all." He said. Koji reached out to shake his hand one final time, as did Midori.

"Thanks again, doctor!" Koji said.

"Just doing my job, sir." The doctor replied, turning and walking down the hallway. A turn to the left, and he had disappeared out of view. With that, the group retired to the ER lobby.

"I'll be going now." Takahashi said, starting towards the door. "I'd stay, but I need to go home and take a nap." Koji stood and shook the teacher's hand.

"I understand. Thank you for helping my daughter. I owe you a great deal." Koji said.

"I'm her teacher, sir. Helping her is my privilege." Takahashi replied, turning once more to go. He was stopped in seconds by a tackling hug to his back.

"Thank you for helping Hikari, sensei!" Himari cried.

"I'm not the one you have to thank." He said, returning the hug. "You really did do good out there. I'm proud of you."

With those final words of praise, he turned once more, and was out the door.