Not What You See
A/N: Whoever told me that nothing else had better happen to this family… you're gonna kill me. *whimpers* Don't kill me. Please? And grr! I didn't realize my Family Tree files saved directly onto the Zip drive now and my dad reclaimed the Zip drive for his computer, so I've lost my trees!
DISCLAIMER: I own only those whom I own. It's too numerous to count.
Chapter 10: Parting Is Not Sweet Sorrow, It Is Painful Sorrow
There wasn't a voice bidding Kai to come as the cell door was opened. Not a word was spoken from the time he left the cell to the time he was released to Kirk and Regine.
"Ya think you can just do whatever you want, kid?" Wade Hiwatari hissed as he advanced menacingly on his son.
The shot rang throughout the quiet country air that cold spring morning. Wade let out a startled and pained gasp as the hurtling bullet buried itself in his neck.
Despite himself, 7-year-old Kai let out a scream. He looked up from his father's dead, bleeding body to the trees where the shot had come from.
The sun glinted off the shining metal barrel of the rifle, the maniacal grin on Kurasu's face clearly evident.
"Listen, kid, I don't know what you think you are, but you're not God!" Gregory Kin yelled at 10-year-old Kai, hand snaking out to slap him across the face.
"Get out," Arthur Tutui told 11-year-old Kai.
"What?" Kai asked bewilderedly.
"OUT!" Arthur yelled. "NOW!" For emphasis, he shot a fist into the backseat at Kai's head.
Startled, Kai scrambled out of the car onto the side of the highway leading into Tokyo and watched as they drove back towards Nagasaki. "Yeah, well, goodbye to you too, you—"
"Hey, kid, why'd you figure my parents want you?" 20-year-old Blake Humira asked 11-year-old Kai tauntingly. "You got found on the highway. Maybe I should just dump you in Kyoto. Would'ja like that, Kai?"
"I am never going back there!" 12-year-old Kai announced definitively to Tala. "Never in my life! I'm tired of people treating me like a punching bag."
"I'm back," 13-year-old Kai told Tala sheepishly as he climbed in the bedroom window. "Sorry. I just couldn't take Akkani's **** anymore."
"Geez, Kai, you almost went a year without landing yourself in an abusive home this time," 14-year-old Tala noted ironically as Kai gently cleaned a nasty cut on his forehead, grimacing as he heard the sounds of Tala's father on the phone downstairs with Dickinson. "I think that's almost a record. What'd he do to you, any way?"
"Threw me against a wall," Kai answered indifferently. "I've had worse."
"Kai, you're home, you're home, you're home, you're home!!" Saadii said happily as she flung her arms around her brother.
"Yeah, I'm back," Kai said carefully. "Saye, stop strangling me."
Immediately, Saadii released him and he gave her a rare grin.
"You have excellent timing to go finish off a sentence," Leif commented easily as he entered. "You missed the whole 'waking-up-screaming-at-3-AM' phase."
"Fancy that," Kai said mildly. "Um, can I go put my bag…"
"Go ahead, dear," Regine said absently, breaking up an argument between Griff and Starr. "Honestly, you two! Can't you get along for one minute?"
"Oh, hey, Kai," Rei said, looking up from his manga. "You're back."
"No, I'm a figment of your imagination." Kai said sarcastically, dumping his bag on the bed.
"Oh, all right," Rei said distractedly, returning to his manga.
Kai snorted and shook his head as he put his art stuff back in the desk drawer he usually kept them in, his Discman and CDs back on the desk and the clothes in the laundry.
"Kai!" Marina shrieked as she passed the room. "You're home!"
"No, really." Kai muttered under his breath, but allowed Marina to hug him momentarily.
"Rei! Kai! Marina! Max! Come down for dinner!" Kirk yelled up the stairs.
As dinner progressed, both Kirk and Regine noticed a definite difference in Kai's attitude since he had left in March. It was almost as if he was hungry for human interaction: he was allowing more physical contact from his 'siblings' than he had ever let them before.
The others were just so used to life without Kai by now that it took even Saadii a while to remember he was once again there.
Two-and-a-half-month-old Chloe and Bronwyn seemed not to care that this new stranger had joined the household. Then again, they were probably still too young to notice.
One afternoon about the beginning of August, after Regine had dropped Max off at a soccer practice, Rei, Saadii and Leif at the mall; Kai off at his still-compulsory psychiatrist appointment, and Marina and Griff both off at their respective friends' houses, she went over to the State Home to go see Mr. Dickinson about something.
It shook her to see the state of living in there. She had thought the city had progressed past this sort of thing.
There was absolutely no real cleaning being done in there, just pushing the junk on the floor to the walls so the traffic could get through the hallways. There was yells and screams and cries in every which direction.
"Whatcha want, lady?" one young child about five years old asked, tugging at her pant leg with a grimy hand.
"Sammy!" an older girl about ten, admonished. "Get back here! That was rude! What can we do for you, ma'am?" she asked politely.
"Can I speak with Stanley, please?" Regine asked uncertainly.
"Mr. D? Sure. Follow me."
Regine followed the girl down the hallway, past what seemed like hundreds of pairs of curious eyes to a small office at the other end of the home.
"Mr. D?" the girl ventured. "Somebody's here to see you, sir."
"All right. Thank you, Stephanie."
Regine entered the room.
"Oh, Regine!" Stanley said cheerfully, closing the door behind her. "What a pleasant surprise!"
"This is an atrocious state of affairs here, Stanley," Regine said bluntly.
"Yes, well, it's not really my place, so I can't do anything about it. All I can do is get these kids homes as soon as I can. Mind you, when it comes to Kai, he came back about fifty times any way."
"Speaking of Kai," Regine started. "Kirk and I have been discussing the possibility of…"
"And?" Kirk prompted when Regine returned home with the kids later.
"He said no." Regine said in a clipped tone.
"What?!" Kirk exclaimed. "To every single one?"
"To every single one," Regine affirmed. "And more bad news besides. Guys, dinner is in half an hour. Don't get too involved in whatever you're going to do."
"Sure," Leif yawned. "I'm just takin' a half hour nap then. Geez, Saadii, you're a shopaholic. Don't you qualify for, like, Shopaholics Anonymous or something?"
Saadii rolled her eyes as she headed down for her bedroom in the basement.
"WHAT?!" Nearly everybody yelped at dinner.
"Calm down," Regine sighed.
"Calm down?!" Rei nearly screeched. "After telling us something like that?!"
"Listen, Rei, I can't do anything about it!" Regine suddenly yelled. "The state's decided there are too many foster children in this house!"
"Can't Mr. Dickinson do something about it?" Max asked, nearly in tears.
"Mr. Dickinson was the one who told me it." Regine sighed again.
"He's not going to do anything," Leif grumbled.
"Never has," Rei and Kai both muttered as one. "Why would he start now?"
After another moment of silence, Kai suddenly paled and left the room.
"Kai!" Kirk called. When there was no answer, he stood up with a frustrated groan and went after him.
"Kai, what is going on with you?" Kirk snapped as he caught Kai aimlessly trying to open up old scars on his arms again. Grabbing one forearm, he whirled the teen around to face him and got an unpleasant shock to discover tears threatening to fall from those blood-coloured eyes. "Kai, answer me," he said, more gently.
"This was my last chance, you know," Kai finally muttered, rubbing the other forearm across his eyes, ashamed to be caught with tears in his eyes. "If I got thrown out of here, I was on my own."
"Kai, Regine and I didn't tell you guys the whole truth," Kirk said regretfully. "We're only supposed to have a maximum of two fosters in the house now, since we have four kids of our own. It's a stupid rule, I know. Stanley has decided you're too unstable emotionally and mentally to leave."
Rei felt like kicking the house down. Too bad he hadn't been paying the closest attention to the class when Jonathan was teaching them the flying powerhouse kick. That probably would've torn the house down nicely. Or at least his room.
'So Dickinson's decided that only five of us have to be kicked out. Kai's not one of them.' Rei thought to himself angrily. 'And of course, Max and I wouldn't get seniority or anything, since we're 'emotionally stable'.'
"What a bunch of bull." Rei said out loud.
"Rei, get out from the shadows," Kirk sighed. "I may as well talk to you too."
"Am I allowed to stay?" came the other three older kids' voices.
"Sure, why not?" Kirk grumbled. "Gonna have to break it sooner or later."
"I'm staying here… with Kai, right?" Saadii asked, a note of panic in her voice.
"Actually…" Kirk hesitated. "You're going back to Nagasaki."
"What?!" Both Saadii and Kai yelled.
"Nagasaki is really supposed to have both of you, but they would only take one of you." Regine said, coming out after having put the younger children to bed, probably for the last time. "Stanley decided you would take it better than Kai."
"So now because Kai's a nutcase, he gets to stay!" Leif exploded.
"Leif!" Regine scolded.
"It's true!" Leif hurled back viciously. "So who else gets to stay? Starr? Jesse?"
"Neither of them," Kirk said, an ironic tone in his voice. "They decided they didn't want to break up your family."
"Yeah, like it's not already broken." Leif muttered. "No sane person would take six kids in one shot."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa." Saadii interrupted. "So they'll break up what's left of my family, but they won't break up his. What's with that?"
"Well, Blanche said she would take—"
"No!" both Kai and Saadii replied in unison.
"That's what I told Stanley you would say," Regine said.
"Any way," Max interrupted again. "Who's staying, then? Me or Rei?"
Kirk moaned. "Neither of you." He said lamely. "Even if the state hadn't decided to toss you all out of here, you two would've been leaving any way."
"Why?" Rei asked suspiciously.
"Because the state decided you should go back to China for good," Regine said, carefully holding back the rage.
"And Judy's come back for Max." Kirk finished, eye twitching.
"What?!" Rei yelled.
"Judy?" Max asked blankly.
"Your biological mother," Regine supplied.
"Oh."
"So in essence, the nutcase gets to stay only because they think he's going to shoot somebody. Again." Leif said angrily.
"Hey, I never actually hit the guy! And he was asking for it!" Kai snapped, fists clenching.
"Boys! Get a hold of yourselves!" Kirk yelled. "In the house, all of you, now! Rei and Saadii, pack tonight, you leave tomorrow morning. Rei, your ride comes for you at 4 in the morning. Saadii, whoever that person is that's coming from Nagasaki will be here at 5:30. Max, start packing, Judy's coming for you tomorrow afternoon. Leif, start packing your stuff, we'll get Starr and Jesse's stuff in the morning, your aunt is coming for you tomorrow afternoon as well. Kai—"
"He's not leaving," Leif said sarcastically. "Remember? He's a nutcase."
"One more time and I'll 'nutcase' you!" Kai snarled, nearly jumping Leif right then, if it weren't for Kirk grabbing his arms to hold him back.
"Kai! Calm down if you don't want to go back to jail for assault!" Kirk snapped.
Still growling curses at Leif, Kai released his tightly-clenched fists and Kirk released him. "Now go back up to your room."
"Hey, at least you get to stay," Rei said stiffly as he took out another pile of clothes from the drawers in his dresser.
"Oh, yeah, whoop-dee." Kai grumbled. "I get to let them take my sister away from me again, not to mention virtually every other person I have ever not hated in my life. And all because I am apparently a maniac waiting to happen."
"Listen, I have lived here for almost ten years now!" Rei snapped. "I have lived with Kirk and Regine longer than I lived with my actual blood family! I hardly remember my blood parents, and my blood sisters are insane!"
"No, you haven't seen insane until you've seen our family," Saadii said from the doorway.
"True enough," Kai admitted grouchily.
"Try me." Rei said doubtfully. "Beat a racist sister who is a totalitarian right out of '1984', and two sisters who are her mindless minions, who constantly attempt to kidnap me."
"At least yours actually wants you," Kai said softly.
"Ours just wants to kill us." Saadii added.
"What?" Max asked, joining them while hopping onto Rei's bed.
"Now that I don't believe." Leif said, sitting down on Kai's abandoned bed, as Kai had claimed the window seat again. "Nobody's family wants to kill them."
"Wanna bet?" Kai challenged. "Beat this: a father who really was insane, we have the documents to prove it; a stepfather who killed our father so he could marry our mother, who doesn't give a **** about anybody but herself; and who is also insane, having the documents to prove it, and who killed my three-year-old sister for no reason at all, but only because he wanted to; two older sisters and two older brothers who all abandoned ship the second they turned 14 years old and the oldest saying that she wants us to come live with her only because she's a social worker and it would look bad if she didn't even try to find and claim the siblings she doesn't actually want, and the other three not even trying; half-siblings who think that they're the only people who inhabit this planet and are spoiled rotten and take after their father,"
"I think we get the idea." Max said shakily.
'Oh, I can go on for a while longer," Kai said.
"And I've probably got another five minutes' worth," Saadii added.
"Spare us," Leif said.
"Okay, you beat me," Rei said. "Man, my family looks almost normal next to yours."
"Wanna trade places?" Saadii asked wistfully.
"No." Rei said. "Somewhere underneath the complacency in Nami and Neko are sisters who might actually care for me. I intend to find them."
"Can't blame a girl for trying." Saadii sighed, pushing her brother over to the other side of the window seat and leaning back against Kai's legs. "Night, boys."
At 3:15 in the morning, Kirk woke up to go make sure that Rei was up and ready to leave by 4. Climbing the stairs to Rei and Kai's room, soon to be only Kai's room (a prospect that none of them were looking forward to), he was slightly surprised to find all the seven foster children sprawled out in various locations in the room.
At some point in the night, Leif must've taken Jesse out of his crib and Starr must have wandered into the room, because all three of the Kinomitas were asleep on Kai's bed. Max was nearly falling off headfirst from the foot of Rei's bed and the two Hiwataris asleep in the window seat, Saadii leaning again Kai's legs and Kai leaning back against the wall in his normal sleeping position when he fell asleep in the window seat. (A/N: Aww…)
Finally locating Rei, curled up in a ball at the head of his bed with Driger sleeping on his head; Kirk poked Rei awake, causing Driger to jump to the floor and stalk off in indignation.
"Wha?" Rei yawned, sitting up.
"Go take your shower, Rei." Kirk said softly. "You leave in forty-five minutes."
"Oh." Rei mumbled, rubbing sleep out of his eyes as he stumbled out into the hallway.
By the time Kai finally woke up after having briefly awakened to say goodbye to his sister, it was nearly two o'clock in the afternoon. Rei, Saadii and Max had all left, and Rebecca Kinomita was in the mud room in the front attempting to load her nephews and niece's bags into the van. Three more kids between Leif and Starr's age were jumping around all three of them, talking excitedly. Marina and Griff were both grumpily occupying themselves out in the backyard.
"Oh, Kai, good, you're up." Regine said busily from the kitchen, banging pots around on the stove.
"Yeah." Kai muttered. "Where's Kirk?"
"He had to go for a last-minute stand-in job down in Ramsay Estates." Regine said distractedly. "Do you want something to eat to hold you over until dinner?"
"No thanks," Kai said, rubbing his left arm absently.
"Will you be okay here with the kids if I go out for a bit?" Regine queried, as the sounds of the front door slamming shut and a vehicle roaring away reached the kitchen. Flinching just the slightest bit, she put away the dishes she had finished doing. "I think I'm going to go see Marie." Marie was one of Regine's closest friends in Tokyo.
"Sure," Kai said, still rubbing his arm.
"Thanks, Kai." Regine said. "Chloe and Bronwyn are both napping, they should probably wake up about three o'clock. Don't let Marina and Griff stay outside all afternoon. Don't forget you've got summer night school tonight if you want to start Grade 11 in September."
"Yeah,"
"And if Kirk calls before I get back, tell him to go pick up some pizza or something." Regine continued to say as she grabbed her purse and keys. "I'll be back before dinnertime."
"All right."
As the door closed yet again that morning, Marina and Griff both came tumbling into the kitchen. It was amazing to Kai how quiet the Toshiro household could be with only five kids in it. Some people would think that it would still be noisy but it wasn't.