Consciousness seeped in with a vague sense of something wrong.

Something . . . missing.

Sano, eyes still closed, sent an exploratory hand out over the rumpled sheets. When all it encountered was cloth, he opened his eyes, frowning. "Fox--?" he started to say, and then remembered.

For the first time in two weeks, he was waking up in his own apartment at dawn.

Alone.

He rolled to his back, one hand fisted on his belly. There was an aching emptiness in his gut. He hadn't realized how much he would miss her . . . The funny thing about it was, it wasn't just about the sex. He loved waking up next to her, listening to her morning sounds, watching her stretch and roll over to smile at him.

Stupid little things that meant everything in the world and more.

At first he had thought it was just the sex--or he'd told himself that. The night he couldn't deny it any longer had been a night about a week ago, now. When dark had fallen, he'd gone to the clinic as usual, but when he got there, he'd found a sign on the door. "Please see Genzai-sensei. Takani-sensei is out."

He'd stared at it uncertainly, then looked around. She couldn't be gone too long, he'd told himself. He'd just wait for her.

There had been a longer note inside, on the table. "Sano: I was called away on a birthing. I don't know how long I'll be. If you want to go, I'll understand."

Hell, he couldn't have gone after that.

He'd wandered aimlessly around the clinic for several minutes. She must have been called out in a hurry--her dinner was still sitting in the kitchen. He'd thought about eating it, but it was barely touched, so she'd be hungry when she came back. He'd covered it and set it on the counter instead.

In the clinic, the medicine cabinet had been half-open and the contents had looked jumbled and disorderly. She really musta been in a hurry--she was a damn demon about her medicine cabinet. A few afternoons of helping out in exchange for supper had given him a rough idea of where things were supposed to go, and he'd left the medicine cabinet closed and neat within.

Eventually, after several more minutes of meandering, he'd gone into her bedroom and unfolded her futon. He'd just settle down and wait, he'd reasoned, stretching out on it. If he took a nap, odds were she'd be home when he woke up.

When he'd opened his eyes, it was dawn, and Megumi was snuggled against him. She'd been wearing her daytime kimono, having only taken off her jacket, and sleeping so deeply she was snoring a little. There had been deep circles under her eyes. When had she gotten home?

Moving carefully, he'd put aside the covers--he hadn't covered up before he'd fallen asleep; that must have been her--and slipped out of bed. He had been fully clothed still, so he hadn't had to perform the morning ritual of hunting for his things.

"Sano?" she'd mumbled drowsily.

Shit--he had woken her. "Gomen, Megitsune," he'd murmured, tucking the covers around her again. "Go back to sleep."

"Nnnh." She'd opened her eyes, blinking at him. "I told you to go home if you wanted," she'd slurred, still half-asleep.

"Well, I didn't want, obviously. Was it bad?"

"No, just long." She'd stretched a little, flexing her toes under the blanket. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay, fox. It's all right. Did you eat when you got home?"

She'd rolled her head against the pillow, a negative head-shake. "Too tired. Just--snuggled up." She'd given him a sweet, drowsy smile, and he had smiled back, leaning over to kiss her.

Her arm had crept around his neck, and she'd made little happy humming noises in her throat. Sexy Megumi. But her kisses were soft and open-mouthed, as drowsy as her voice, and it was dawn.

"Go back to sleep," he said again as he broke away.

"Aa," she mumbled, and closed her eyes again.

She was snoring again before he closed the shoji.

The door to the clinic was bare of the sign that had occupied it the night before, and he went back inside to look for it. He'd found it in moments, lying on the table. So what if people had to go to Genzai-sensei for a little bit more, he'd reasoned, sticking it back on the door. She needed her sleep. Then he'd wandered down the street again, watching the dawn.

For some reason, that night and morning, of all the ones they'd spent together, stuck out in his mind the most. It was the only one of the fourteen that they hadn't had sex--in fact, neither of them had even taken off their clothes. But he remembered it--the way Megumi had snuggled against him, the drowsiness of her voice, the sweet langour of the way she'd kissed him goodbye. The sweetness of it had reached deep down into his soul and filled up an empty spot he hadn't even known he'd had.

Sano rolled to his feet. He had to see her.

When he knocked on the front door, nobody answered, so he let himself in. "Fox?" he called out. Nothing. "Genzei-sensai?" Maybe the old doctor could tell him where to find her.

A step sounded behind him, and he turned. It was Kei. Just who he didn't want to see.

"Did you need something?"

Your sister. "I--uh . . ." He trailed off under Kei's cool gaze, strangely like his sister's when she wanted to freeze someone out. "My hand," he said suddenly, pulling the appendage out of his pocket. "It's been hurting, and I was wondering if the f--Megumi could take a look at it. If she had time. Ya know. If she wasn't busy. And maybe she could change the bandages. Or something."

Kei waited until Sano had wound down, feeling like the biggest idiot on the face of the planet. "She's with a patient," he said finally. "Genzai-sensei hasn't arrived. I'll look at it."

What was there to say to that? "Thanks."

Kei's hands were completely impersonal, and the initial unwrapping was carried out in silence. If this were Megumi, Sano thought, flexing his newly-freed fingers at the other man's command, they'd already have shot each other full of verbal holes by this time, and enjoyed it.

"What did you do to it?" Kei asked, feeling the bones.

"Broke it," Sano said.

That earned him a look that said Duh.

"In a fight," he added. There was very little of his too-violent life that he still woke up in a sweat about, but the final showdown at Shishio's stronghold ranked right up there with the death of Sagara Souzou for that.

"Hm."

"Chikuso!" he howled as Kei found a tender spot.

"Did that hurt?"

"No, I just like swearing!"

"A simple yes or no would have done."

Sano rolled his eyes.

After more prodding, Kei asked, "How long ago was this broken?"

"Two months, maybe more. Dunno." Was it? It was nearly August now, hotter 'n' hell, too . . . yeah, two months. And it had been early July that night he and Megumi had first--

"And you say my sister was taking care of it?"

"Hey, don't blame her for how bad it is. I do all sortsa stuff with it she tells me not to--fightin' . . . gambling . . . stuff . . ." He trailed off. Megumi was standing in the doorway behind Kei, smiling a faint, ironic smile. After a moment, he smiled back. "Every time I come here to get it fixed up," he said to Kei, his eyes focused on her, "she fixes it up and scolds hell outta me, then I go out and do it all again. It's not her fault, I'm just a stubborn cuss and I do what I wanna do. "

"You'll have to stop that, or you may never be able to use your hand correctly again."

"Yeah, that's what she keeps telling me."

Megumi laughed silently, putting her hand over her mouth.

"What's this?"

Sano looked down to see the thin pink line that ran across the width of his palm. He felt suddenly sick, his lightheartedness gone. "Nothing," he said, trying to pull his hand away.

Kei held on with a deceptively light grip on his wrist. "It looks as if it was made with a knife."

Behind her hand, Megumi's smile had disappeared, and her skin blanched. She hadn't told Kei, Sano realized. Whether she hadn't gotten to it yet, or she was never going to, she didn't want Sano spilling the beans about Takeda Kanryuu, as he certainly would have to if forced to tell the whole story of her attempted suicide.

Sano made himself shrug. "I--picked one up wrong. It was stupid. Megumi stitched it up for me," he added.

"I could have guessed that--it's too neat to be otherwise." Kei reached for a fresh bandage roll and began rewrapping his hand.

In the doorway behind him, his sister let out a soft sigh of relief. Color returned, slowly, to her skin.

At the sigh, Kei looked over his shoulder. "Megumi. Done?"

"For the moment," she returned in a voice that was deceptively normal. She came in, kneeling to look at Sano's hand. "Was it hurting?" she asked, looking up into his face.

Forgetting he'd told Kei otherwise, Sano said, "Nah. Just wanted the bandages changed. They were gettin' scuzzy."

"So you came here, like you always do," Megumi said lightly, settling back on her heels.

"Where else would I go? This is the best clinic in Tokyo."

Kei said absently, tucking in the end of the bandage, "And I'm sure it'll remain so, even after Megumi leaves."

"Leaves?"

Kei looked up, his brows raising to match his sister's. "Of course." He looked at his sister. "Megumi--you are coming back to Aizu with me, aren't you? You're all I have left now."

Sano thought, looking at her, and Kei, no matter what I think of him, is all she's got left now. For years, the dream of seeing her family again had kept her alive when life was so terrible that a woman of lesser soul would have merely given up. But Megumi had persevered with that single aim in mind--to have her family again--and now she had it. Just because she'd shared two of best weeks of Sano's life with him didn't mean she owed him anything.

She looked a little dazed. Maybe she hadn't thought of this. Sano sure hadn't.

"Family belongs together," Kei continued, looking at her anxiously.

"Yes," she murmured. "Yes, it does."

Sano rose, flexing his rewrapped hand. He put it in his pocket and looked down at her, still sitting with her eyes wide. "Kaoru will wanna have a party or somethin'," he said.

She looked up at that. "For when I leave?"

So that was it. Of course, Kei had said, and it was of course after all. "Yeah." He made himself say the words. "For when you leave."