Baby Mukai had gotten bigger.
She was sitting up on her own now. Well she had this little pink and purple baby chair with a dangling thing in front of it but that still counted. He was so proud of her. She remembered him, too. She smiled at him. She was smiling up at him from her little baby chair in her new home. This was an apartment in the Seventh Division compound. It was just like the one that he and dad and big sis had stayed in when they had stayed in the Seventh Division last year. The walls were the same white and the carpet was the same beige color and the couch was the same black on they had and the TV was the same one day had and the shelves were the same white ones and the kitchen was in the same place and the hallway was just as long and dark and everything was just…the same.
But also different.
The walls were covered in pictures. Photos, not art, but actual photos. Like mom had put up in the Castle…which made sense because Mukai had a mom, now, and that was what moms did. They put up your picture. There was a big picture of Mukai on the wall in a pink dress that Sho had never seen, and a bow so people could tell she was a girl, and also she was smiling and….and it was nice. There were other pictures, too. Pictures of Mukai and her new mom at the zoo and the park and at a summer festival it looked like…lots of pictures of Mukai. Some of just her and some of her and her mom and some of just her mom.
Her mom was nice.
She used to be a fighting champion. There were pictures of her with trophies and medals, the same ones on the shelves, and also pictures of her beating people up…but like on TV not like what dad did to people. There were other pictures, too. Pictures of her when she was little. Pictures of her with two old people who might have been her parents and grandparents or something. There was a picture of her with all the other Scars from the Seventh Division. Even the division leader, the short lady who never took off her mask even though it was weird. The Scars dressed weird here. Kind of funny, like that guy with the big shoulder pads, or even the guy with the Mohawk and all of the piercings.
Mukai was going to be happy here.
"Here, I drew this for you. It's what you look like and also I drew a cat next to you because cats are cool." Said Sho as he opened his sketchbook and showed her the picture that he had drawn her. She was smiling and looking at him. He had no idea how much she understood. He tried to say it again in Korean.
His Korean wasn't really that good.
But she still smiled at him. She smiled and reached out for his sketchbook. He held it closer. He had read that babies didn't really see that well. It was because there wasn't a lot to look at while they were inside of the mom's stomach. Sho would have kept his eyes closed, too, if he had to be inside of a mom's stomach. The stomach acid and stuff could have gotten in his eyes. He wondered if baby sis remembered being in her mom's stomach…or if she even remembered her mom. Her stomach mom. She had a new mom and even though she hadn't come out of her new mom's stomach that was still her mom.
She was nice.
"Hey kid, you want something to drink? Like a soda or something?" asked Tsuchiya. She was baby Mukai's new mom. She was so cool! She always wore her fighting uniform, Sho knew that it had a special name but he forgot, and she had big muscled arms and she could totally keep Mukai safe and stuff. Also she was taking really good care of Mukai. She had found out how to get her socks to stay on and also the house didn't smell like throw up so that meant that baby sis hadn't been throwing up all day.
Also she was there.
It was very important for a mom to be there. His mom had left but baby sis' new mom wouldn't. She couldn't. She was a part of Claw and the only way out of Claw was dying. Also she was a Scar, which was a good rank, so she wouldn't have wanted to leave either. She also had picked Mukai so, of course, she wanted to be her mom. Not like his mom. She had run away…
But he doesn't want to think about that.
"Yes, please." Said Sho. He remembered the please part. That was good manners. He had bad manners, dad was always telling him that he had bad manners, and he didn't want to have bad manners around baby Mukai's new mom. Then she might have thought that he was a bad influence on her and she would make him go back to the rooms he and Fukuda were staying in. He didn't want that to happen. He wanted to spend as much time with baby sis as he could.
He had missed her so much.
Baby sis' new mom got up and went to the kitchen. He could still sense her even though his back was to her. It was weird being around a girl who wasn't his sister. He didn't know a lot of girls. Just his sister and his pretend sister. He wondered if Mukai would have a lot of friends growing up. She was a girl esper and there weren't a lot of them. Well that was ok because he would be her friend. He and baby sis would be friends and then he and big sis would be her friends…
Or maybe not big sis.
She couldn't know about this. She would not be able to keep this a secret. She would tell dad and then dad would be all mad at him and then he would move baby sis and her mom to a new division or something. They were talking about either reopening the Eighth Division or even building a Ninth Division but that was all talk. They spent a lot of time in Japan these days. That made it easier to visit her. If she were in Brazil or New Zealand or Canada or something then it would be harder to see her since they didn't spend a lot of time in those places.
Also there was a Disneyland here and he would take her when she got old enough to be able to eat the food and ride the rides.
He heard the ding of a microwave. He turned around and saw baby sis' new mom testing a bottle to see if it was too cold or too warm. She did it on her fingers. Big sis had showed him how to do that on his arm. Sho wondered if she knew which kind of formula to feed her. Some kinds of formula made her throw up after she ate or while she ate and some made her go to the bathroom too often and some not often enough…babies had very sensitive stomachs. He wondered why her new mom didn't just give her human milk. That was why girls had boobs, right? They were like water balloons full of milk?
That was his understanding of it, anyway.
He didn't know and he figured that asking a girl about her boobs was a pretty quick way of getting kicked out. Fukuda had told him that he had to be good, he had been very clear, because otherwise Mukai's mom would make him leave. Moms were very protective of their babies, Fukuda had said, even though didn't need to be told that. He knew already not to mess with a mom's babies. Like when he and Shimazaki and Shibata had found the next with the baby birds in it and they had tried to play with them…and then the momma bird pecked their heads and they had to run away…
He didn't want baby sis' new mom to peck his head…or whatever human moms did when they thought that you were after their babies.
"Here you go, Suzuki, sorry but I only have diet." Said Tsuchiya as she handed him a can of diet grape soda…the worst kind of soda…but he still smiled and took it. He decided to pretend to be big sis in that moment. He had to be nice and polite and good…and next time he would bring his own soda. Who drank diet? And who drank grape? And who drank diet and grape often enough that they kept cans of it in their house?
She was still a good mom even though she had no idea how to choose a can of soda.
"Thank you very much. I love diet grape soda." Said Sho lying through his teeth. Baby Mukai was looking at him. Well she was switching between looking at him and looking at the TV. It was some kind of baby show. He wanted to watch something else but he wasn't going to change the channel…even though this would turn her brain into mush. It couldn't have been any worse, though, than her listening to him tell lies. He didn't want to turn her into a liar but he also didn't want to make her new mom mad…
And also sometimes it was ok to tell lies.
Fukuda said so. If anyone asked why Sho wasn't with the inspection group he was to say that he got bored and wanted to play in his room. That was what he was supposed to say if anyone, but especially dad, asked him. He could do that. Mom had said that lies were bad but…but this lie was ok. Sometimes it was ok to tell lies. Like when someone gave you a really bad tasting soda. You still had to accept it and drink it even though it tasted like…like he didn't even know what.
This was the kind of soda they gave to traitors to torture them.
"You sure, kid? Because you look like you're sucking on a lemon. I have tap water and milk, too, if you'd rather-" said Tsuchiya
"No. This is good. Thank you." Said Sho. He smiled, too, which was also something that you were supposed to do to be polite. He was acting just like big sis. She said that she had to remind herself to smile, sometimes, and to make other faces too. She said that it was hard to figure out what face to make. That was weird. You just sort of knew….unless you were lying like he was now. He tried to make himself mean that smile. Baby sis reach over and tried to grab his shirt. Ok, now he meant that smile.
"You're welcome. Hey, move over. I've got to feed her now." Said Tsuchiya. Sho felt scared as her new mom unbuckled her from her little baby chair. He was…was scared because…because she was taking her away…even though the feelings he had made no sense at all. That was baby Mukai's new mom. Of course she could pick up her own baby.
Of course she could take her own baby away.
That was her baby and she could do what she wanted….like take her away again. Sho…he couldn't let himself feel like this. She was happy, now, and he knew that she was happy now. She deserved a mom who was nice to her and took care of her and she deserved to be in a place like this where her shows were on the TV and her pictures were up on the walls and her socks stayed on and also she didn't smell like throw up or pee. She was happy and…and Sho should have been glad for her.
Glad that she had been taken away.
Even though he had done all the things that you were supposed to do for a baby. Even though he had fed her and played with her and changed her clothes when she threw up on them and made sure that she watched good TV and showed her how to draw pictures and stuff….and he had done a good job!...calm down. He had done a good job and…and a mom could do a much better job than a big brother could. That was why big sis could never be a substitute for their mom. Because she was just a sister and not a mom even though she did all the things, too, that a mom was supposed to do.
He should have been happy for Mukai.
"Why are you feeding her now? She isn't crying." Said Sho. Baby sis would tell you when she needed something. She had never been shy about telling everyone when she needed something. She wasn't crying now, no, she was pulling on her new mom's hair and kicking her feet. She was happy.
"It's her lunch time. I like to feed her before she gets herself all upset. It's just easier." Said Tsuchiya as she walked over to the couch and sat down. Sho watched her. He wasn't sure if he should go and sit next to her. He wasn't sure how the guest was supposed to act. He hadn't been a guest in someone's home in…ever….and he had no idea what the rules were.
"How do you get her to eat when she's not hungry? When we would try and feed her when she wasn't hungry she would push the bottle away and throw up and stuff." Said Sho
"Practice. Lots of practice. I'm you and your dad had your own schedule-" said Tsuchiya as baby Mukai sucked on her bottle. That was a different kind of bottle than the ones that they'd fed her with. It was plain. Her bottles at home had been pink and had characters on them. This one was plain. Mukai didn't seem to care. She ate and ate and ate…and she didn't cry or throw up.
"No, not me and my dad. Me and my big sis. Dad was away on a mission when we took care of her." said Sho. He wasn't' a kid. He could do things like take care of his little sister. Like he could have been taking care of her right now. He could have fed her. Tsuchiya wasn't holding her right. She liked to sit up while she ate. Tsuchiya had her laying down. She needed to sit up so that way the throw up wouldn't go everywhere.
"And…the healer too, right? I mean your dad didn't just leave two kids alone with a baby…right?" said Tsuchiya. She was holding the bottle at too low of an angle, now, and Mukai was trying to pull on it. Sho wondered if she knew how baby sis needed to be burped afterwards. How you had to be careful or she would throw up in your hair. How you had to also try and get her to nap after she ate…
And Sho didn't want her to take a nap.
He didn't know how long he had with her. Fukuda said that he could visit Tsuchiya and Mukai for as long as the inspection would take. It could have been anywhere from two days to two weeks depending on how cooperative Ishiguro, the Division Leader lady, felt like being. He didn't want to waste any time at all that he could have been spending with his little sis.
He had no idea when he would be able to see her again.
"No, it was just me and big sis…well her friends helped. Minegishi and Shimazaki and Shibata-" said Sho
"The upper echelon enforcers?" asked Tsuchiya. She was holding the bottle way too low. Mukai was starting to get all baby mad. She was kicking and making her little upset baby noises. How hard was it to hold a bottle? Sho stopped himself from getting up and doing it himself. Even though he knew that he could have done better than that.
"Yeah, them. They're the guys who follow my dad around and keep him safe and deal with traitors and stuff like that." Said Sho. He didn't know what that face she was making was about. Maybe Mukai had peed on her or something. She did that sometimes if you didn't tape her diapers on good enough. She would have peed less if she ate solid foods but she was too little to eat solid foods…right? He didn't know. She didn't have any teeth so she must have still been too young for solid food.
Sho wondered if, when he saw her again, she would be old enough to eat solid foods.
He'd get her a big churro, maybe, or some ice cream. Something good. Some soda, too, but not enough to make her sick or anything like that. Something good. Something that she would remember. He had no idea how much she would remember but he hoped that she ended up remembering him. He was her big brother…her pretend big brother…after all.
He loved her more than anything else in the whole world.
"You…you were all watching her? Alone? How?" asked Tsuchiya
"We took good care of her. Well I took the most good care of her since big sis was busy filling in for dad and stuff. I kept her clean and I fed her and also when I fed her I didn't let her bottle dip down like that. She's getting mad and she's eating air and when she eats air her stomach gets upset." Said Sho. He knew that he was being a little bit rude but he didn't care. He didn't want her to have an upset baby stomach and then throw up baby throw up everywhere.
He knew how to take care of her.
"Wha-oh. Right. Still getting the hang of this. Sorry Mukai, momma's sorry." said Tsuchiya. Sho felt…like he didn't even know what he felt. He knew that he should have been happy that Mukai had a mom and all but…but he could have done better than that! Why did she have to be taken away from him? He had been a great big brother. He had taken better care of her in three weeks than dad had taken of him and big sis in the whole time that he had been a dad! Sho could have taken care of her for the rest of her life.
But she needed a mom.
Kids were not moms and dads no matter what dad thought. She needed a mom and she had a mom. She had a mom who would last forever. She had a mom who could never leave. Nobody left Claw alive. She was a Scar and she would never be able to leave. Mukai would never wake up one day and her mom would have just been gone and she would have been all alone…that would never happen to her. She would never, ever, ever have to go through anything like that.
Not while he was around.
"She likes it when you rub her back while she eats, too, and then again after she burps." Said Sho. He wanted so badly to hold his baby sister…but he couldn't just run up and take her out of her new mom's arms. That would have gotten him kicked out and he did not want to be kicked out. He wanted to spend as much time with her and humanly possible. He had no idea if or when he would ever see her again…and it wasn't fair to him but…but he needed to stop being selfish.
She had a mom. She needed a mom and she had a mom and he should have been happy for her instead of constantly thinking about how much he wanted her back.
"Here, how about you come up and feed her then, Big Brother-san." Said Tsuchiya. She was smiling at him and she seemed happy…so she wasn't going to kick him out. That was good…and also she was giving him permission to feed baby sis! He didn't need to be told twice. He got up as fast as he could and practically threw himself onto the couch. He was so excited! He got to feed her again! He could remember the last time he fed her. It had been a few minutes before Fukuda came in to take her.
She was put in his arms.
She held her own head up. She was trying to sit up. He sat her up the way she liked it. She was so warm…how had he forgotten how warm she was? How had he forgotten what it felt like to hold her? He loved her so much. He held her bottle in place. She was trying to help him, it felt like, and she….she was so smart. She was so smart and she had learned so much and there was still so much less to teach her and…and he wanted to stay. He wanted dad to make him into a Scar so he could stay forever with his baby sis and just….just be with her.
But that was never going to happen.
He wished that he were older. If he were older, old enough to run Claw, then he could have just said that he was going to keep baby sis. If he had been an adult then big sis would have been adults and then Fukuda would have had no reason at all to take baby sis away. If he had been an adult then he could have just married her new mom or something….ick…actually no that was a last resort thing. He didn't want to be married. He already had a girl to boss him around. She was called his big sister.
Maybe Fukuda could have married her mom.
Fukuda could have married her mom, he wasn't married and she wasn't married so it made sense, and then he could have seen baby sis whenever he wanted to because Fukuda's job was to follow dad around and stuff. It would have been perfect. Fukuda would have been able to give baby sis back to Sho and big sis and then he wouldn't have had to do any of the taking care of the baby stuff or any of that husband stuff either. They'd already had a baby, baby sis, so he wouldn't have had to kiss her or hold her hand or any of the other gross stuff that married people did.
But he got the feeling that Fukuda would not have gone along with that plan if Sho proposed it to him.
"You like that? Do you like your formula? It's special for you. It'll help you grow up big and strong. You want that, right? To grow up big and strong? You got so big I almost didn't recognize you. Not that I'm calling you fat or anything. You're supposed to be getting bigger. One day you'll be so big that we can play together. Then I'll teach you all kind of stuff. It'll be great. Like how to hold up your own bottle. See? You don't have it yet but I can teach you." Said Sho softly as he held her in his arms like she liked and he rubbed her back like she liked. Even her little baby aura seemed happy.
"You're pretty good at that, Big Brother-san." Said Tsuchiya. Sho let her call him that even though it was just for pretend. Fukuda said that people would think that she was really his little sister if he went around calling himself her big brother…and he didn't think that it would be such a bad thing. Who would come after her and hurt her? She lived in the Seventh Division compound, her mom was a professional fighter, and she was an esper too. He felt sorry for the moron who came here looking to cause trouble, looking to hurt her, he felt sorry for them…
Because he would kill them.
He would kill anyone who even thought about hurting his baby sister. It didn't matter where he was in the world, even if it was countries and oceans away, or even what time it was. It could have been early in the morning or late at night. It wouldn't matter. If someone tried to hurt his baby sis then he would kill them so bad that even their ghosts would be dead…or something. They'd be dead and their ghosts would be super dead and then they wouldn't be able to hurt baby sis.
Because he was her big brother and that was what big brothers did…they protected their sisters.
He had been such a jerk to big sis but he could be better for little sis. He had to be better for little sis. Even though they didn't have the same mom and dad he would still be there for her. He would still take care of her. That was what little sisters needed, their big brothers, and for her he would be the best big brother in the whole world.
Because she was the best little sister in the whole world.
"Well she deserves it. She's a pretty good little sister." Said Sho meaning every single word of it. No matter how much time passed, no matter how much bigger she got, no matter how much bigger he got, she would always be the best little sister in the whole, wide, world to him.
She would.