Over the next few days it becomes much more apparent that Andy isn't entirely herself. Her interactions with the group remain the same, in fact, some might be pressed to admit that she's become more affectionate with those in her personal circle. What's changed is her attitude. Andy hasn't changed in the sense that she's still sarcastic, still a little reckless, still a little too unafraid of life, it's in the sense that every once in a while she'll go silent for long stretches of time before coming back to herself a touch more contemplative than she'd been half an hour before. It takes a little longer for her to reply to her shortened name, she sleeps less and eats more, occasionally she'll find herself slipping off into a sort of limbo state where everything drowns itself out except for the faint whispering of a trillion wispy voices that seem to come from nowhere and everywhere all at once. That's usually in the evenings after everyone's settled down to eat dinner and sleep, though. Obviously she hadn't been prepared for anything that happened between her and her... other self... but one would think that with as painful as their coming together had been Andy would be further along in mastering her abilities than hearing strange whispers on the wind and staring off into space.
Everyone notices of course, she can't be the only one to see that something's up with her, but between gathering the jewel fragments and everyone's personal dramas there hasn't exactly been a good time for any of them to sit down and hash out a plan in regards to her situation. Inuyasha and Miroku had seemed troubled by the fact that there'd been another Andy floating around in the world but hardly surprised considering they've both seen stranger things than that. Shippo's the only one who has offered Andy any real peace of mind by comparing her merging - that's what she's calling it now - with her older, past self to that of an older demon. Apparently, when a powerful demon reaches a certain point of maturity their baser instincts, the more primal part of them that makes them a demon, makes them dangerous, merges with their conscious mind to create a sort of higher power. Elevated entity? Andy doesn't really think it's the same thing but it's better than Inuyasha's thought that she's slowly going to be consumed by her older self. She think he might have been joking around to mess with her head but who's to say for sure with him.
When word reaches them about a sliver of the jewel being held at a demon slayer's village any more thought of Andy's situation is put on a back burner anyway. Finding the jewel shards - and through them, Naraku - is way more important right now than fretting over Andy's mental state, so off they go in search of the village. No one really knows where it is but some of the more reliable people Andy, Kagome, or Miroku have interviewed claim it to be in hidden the mountains. But with no way to pinpoint an exact location the group has been reduced to trekking the surrounding area in search of the demon slayer village. It's already well into their third day of traveling and despite not needing the sleep Andy's tired of wandering around aimlessly. Rolling her eyes, Andy tucks an elastic hair tie between her teeth and scrapes her hair back into a high ponytail at the back of her head while she watches Inuyasha lead the group further along the base of the mountain as Kagome and Miroku comment on their lack of success.
"Inuyasha," Shippo says from his perch on the half-demon's shoulder, "are you planning on stealing the jewel from them?"
"Of course!" Inuyasha barks.
Miroku lets loose a resigned sort of huff before saying, "So long as we're not slain first."
"I'll say! Those people are supposed to be pros!" Kagome glances off to the side before continuing with a soft, "But I'm curious about how the Sacred Jewel came to be. They claim that the Sacred Jewel first appeared in their province."
Ominous wind causes the trees to sway around them. The faint whispering that's been following Andy around since the merging grows a little louder. Thousands upon thousands of tiny voices calling out, vying for her attention, but Andy can't understand a word that's being said to her despite it all. Too much noise. Kind of hard to focus on one voice when there are even more whisper-screaming at you. Sometimes she'll pick up little words of endearments, the last word of a question, the middle of a request, but none of them make any sense and Andy can't piece anything together so she stops trying. Blocking out the noise is nearly impossible but not paying much attention to it is surprisingly easy.
"Something is approaching, lots of them." Kagome's voice is clearer and cuts off the whispering rather efficiently by giving Andy something to focus on.
Andy looks up just in time to see a large purple-black mass blot out the moon. It takes her a second to realize that the mass is made up of demons. All sorts of them. Most look more like animals than humans, though, and they're all too preoccupied trying to get wherever they're going to notice the little group of humans ogling them from the ground below. Thankfully. Andy isn't sure she's ready to throw down with a bunch of ravenous demons at the moment.
"This is really weird!" Kagome says, tone pitched with worry.
"She'e right... I'm starting to feel worse and worse."
"They're going to attack something!" Inuyasha claims, then he takes off running, Andy only a few steps behind, because is there are people being attacked she isn't going to just let them die... even if her powers are a bit wonky Andy can still help. Somehow.
Screaming in the distance tells Andy she's almost to wherever the demons had been heading for and so she picks up the pace, zipping down the beaten dirt path as fast as her body will carry her, and for a moment it's almost like she's flying. She thinks she might have passed Inuyasha. She's pretty sure she doesn't care. Because when she clears the treeline she's greeted by the horrible sight of a village on fire, the walls protecting the settlement doing nothing but trapping the humans inside with the hoard of demons currently descending upon the village. Andy doesn't think twice before sprinting for the wall, her power helping her clear the distance between the village and the treeline in seconds rather than the minutes it would take to take the path leading up the mountainside. When she reaches the wall Andy uses a ball of white light to blow a hole in the fortifying structure large enough for her to slip through. Hopefully any stray humans will be able to slip through the hole as well and get as far from the village as possible. If they can. The entire village is in chaos, so it wouldn't surprise Andy is no one notices the hole in the wall in the first place.
Demons are everywhere. They've set fire to the homes and any other wooden structure they can get their hands on, tearing into animals and humans with a sort of violence that seems needless. A small, trembling thing collides with her legs just seconds before a little voice begins screaming something in frantic, terrified sounding Japanese. There's no thought. No scramble to call forth her power. She simply summons a shield around herself and the child seconds before a large snake-like demon slams into it with enough force to rattle her teeth. Andy watches as he goes up in flames, reduced to a pile of ash within seconds, but not before it lets out a horrible screech. The shield has always been easy for her to summon so she's not surprised by how much faster it came to her this time, what surprises her is that it's capable of reducing a demon to ash. No one has ever touched her shield before, though, so she supposes she wouldn't have known it was capable of such a thing before now. Grimacing, Andy turns to the child. He looks battered but he's alive and there aren't any immediate dangers to him that Andy can see. With little hesitation she gathers the child into her arms and continues into the village with the hope that she can at least offer any other surviving villages shelter from the attacks.
She saves a handful of lives as she moves through the inferno, destroying demons left and right as quickly as she can with her growing number of charges huddled around and pressed against her. And it's from behind the safety of her shield that she sees a demon clad in a white baboon skin leap over the wall and make for a home that has yet to be destroyed by the fire. A demon slayer behind her urges her to go after it, claiming that the Sacred Jewel shards that have been collected by the chief of the village were protected there, and Andy wants to. Oh, how she wants to. But there are three children, a baby, a pregnant woman, two teens, and a seriously wounded man in her care now. None of them are in fit condition to defend themselves from the masses of demons currently trying to kill everything with a heartbeat. Jewel shards are one thing, but these people don't deserve to die like this either... Besides, if the demon in the baboon skin is who Andy thinks it is she doesn't want to try fighting him and every other demon in this village by herself without some sort of backup. So she keeps her shields strong, ignores the desperate pleading coming from the few remaining villagers who are far beyond her help at the moment, and destroys anything that comes within three feet of her while occasionally peeling apart her shield to allow more people in. After a while the demons seem to realize that none of them are powerful enough to get through her barrier, too many having died at her hands before the others came to the decision that her and the few humans with her aren't worth their interest.
By the time the sun has risen in the sky the demons are gone and the village isn't much more than a burning pile of rubble and smoke.
Once she's certain nothing's going to pop up and try to eat her, Andy lowers her shield so she can focus on healing the villagers she saved. One of the men she manages to save goes first as his wounds are more serious and life-threatening than the others in their small group. One of the demons had managed to get their teeth into his leg, severing the limb completely just under the knee, and the only reason the man didn't die of blood loss is because someone in the group was smart enough to use a strip of fabric and a long chunk of wood to make a tourniquet. Andy focuses on that feeling of peace she'd gotten at Kaede's village, pulls the power into her hands and pushes it into the man's body so that she can repair splintered bones and ruined blood vessels. There's nothing she can do for his leg she doesn't think. Now probably isn't the time to try rebuilding people's limbs anyway. So satisfied that the man isn't going to die Andy shifts her attention to the others. It's about this time that Kagome and the others come running into the village.
"Kagome! Inuyasha!" Andy calls the moment she spots them, "Start looking for survivors!"
Blue eyes settle on her, on the people huddled around her, and narrow slightly as shapely brows furrow. Kagome's quick to head off, Inuyasha too, Miroku's the only one who comes over to help her with the villagers she managed to save.
"Hello," he greets in gentle, dulcet tones, "my name is Miroku, this is my traveling companion Lady Andromeda, would you mind telling us what happened here?"
The little boy she saved first stumbles closer with large, glassy eyes that seem to rip through her. He reaches out for her and Andy can't find it in herself to refuse, so she picks him up and cuddles him close and begins softly humming a tone she barely remembers hearing. While he's distracted Andy goes about healing the mild burns and scrapes scattered across his body.
"The demons came so suddenly," the pregnant woman cries, "we didn't have any time to stop them and all of our best slayers went out to-"
She breaks off with a ragged sob. Miroku, thankfully, pulls aside an older man so that they can speak while Andy focuses on the remaining people in her group. Carefully, she settles herself down in front of the pregnant woman and reaches out to place a hesitant hand on her swollen abdomen. Something flutters against her hand, a heartbeat, a feeling of safety. She pulls herself away from the pregnant woman and offers what she hopes is a comforting smile, it's a smile that quickly fades when the low rumble of something big pops up behind her.
Whipping around, Andy finds herself facing a cat-demon about the size of a small bear, with wide red eyes and a double set of tails, it's got a severed demon head clenched in it's mouth and it does very little to put Andy at ease. Slowly, so as not to set the demon off, Andy puts herself between the cat-demon. Thankfully, it's about that time that Inuyasha comes rushing around the corner with Kagome. The moment he sees the demon cat, Inuyasha whips out his father's sword and moves directly in front of Kagome.
"A demon survivor!" Inuyasha calls, though Andy wonders if it's more of a question.
Behind Andy, none of the villagers seem overly worried, in fact, the children seem delighted to see the demonic kitty. Which means that surely it can't be too dangerous right? If none of the villagers are worried about it then why should Andy be? A quick glance behind her shows the villagers paying very little attention to the demonic cat and instead sitting in a tight circle talking quietly among themselves.
"That voice belongs to Inuyasha!" It's disjointed, and comes from seemingly no where but Andy finds odd comfort in it when the voice continues with a firm, "Back off, Kirara. These people are not enemies."
Fire ignites around the demonic cat's body, a large plume that seems to swallow the thing whole, and when it fades there's no longer a bear sized demon but an adorable kitten. It's literally the most adorable thing Andy has ever seen in her entire life. What's not as adorable is the flea demon that bounces off the demon's nice and over to where Inuyasha is standing with Kagome. Seeing as he probably knows quite a bit more than anyone else does it's probably best for him to tell Inuyasha and Kagome what's going on while Andy and Miroku tend to graves and searching out survivors. It's not pretty work. The remaining villagers try to help but the children don't need to see the bodies and Andy thinks that they've all endured enough trauma today that subjecting them to this might be a little too much. She doesn't stop them from helping if they insist but she's thankful when those who are capable go about helping Miroku find what he needs and not helping Andy with the bodies. Eventually Inuyasha joins her and together they roll out mats to lay the recovered dead upon while Kagome tries to settle the rightfully frazzled nerves of the survivors.
The worst part about pulling people from the debris isn't the state of their remains - bloody and mangled though they are - but rather the fact that the ones Andy seems to find are young. Children. Babies. There are women and men as well but the horribleness of it is different in a way. Andy grits her teeth as she lays a little boy down beside an elderly man. She doesn't help Inuyasha or Miroku put the bodies in their graves because she doesn't thinks he could handle laying a baby to rest, so she helps Kagome gather flowers to leave as offerings when everyone has been buried. Once the offerings are placed Andy helps the man she saved over so that he can say his final goodbyes to those he lost alongside the others she managed to save.
Eventually, after their goodbyes have been said, Andy helps gather supplies for the villagers and loads everything that will fit into a cart. None of them can linger. But it's important that they ensure the safety of the remaining villagers.
"Is there a village close by? Somewhere safe for you?" Andy asks as she assists in loading the cart.
Reasonably, the villagers don't want to remain in the village any longer. There's not enough protection, no reason to stay, and none of them are in a place where they can go about repairing the village and tending to their living needs. Remaining so close to demons - no matter how helpful - has also got to be hard with everything that happened the night before. Andy doesn't blame them for wanting to leave and leave without them, but she can't help but worry for everyone's safety despite the reassurance that the trip will be safe enough.
"There is a village west of here, only a day's walk, we should be there by nightfall." One of the teenagers says.
"Do you have family there?"
"No," says the other, "but it's a village we've visited often enough and have good standing in."
Why wouldn't they though? They're demon slayers, almost every human is going to at least respect that.
"Are you certain you don't want one of us to travel with you? There's safety in numbers." She says, and the two teens glance at each other for a long moment before the taller of the two shakes his head.
"No, thank you, but we'd best be leaving soon."
Knowing she isn't going to get through to any of them Andy makes sure to see them off and to double check everyone for injuries she may have missed. Thankfully, they don't fight her on it or push away her concern. They seem rather well adjusted considering everything they've gone through the past few days but Andy would probably blame that on them coming from a demon slayer village. Death isn't something they've never witnessed before. Andy gnaws at the inside of her cheek as she watches the two teens lead the cart away until they've disappeared from sight. She feels like she didn't do enough for them, feels like if she'd just been faster or smarter or a better fighter she would have been able to save more people.
Beating herself up over it now isn't going to change anything. People have died. There's no coming back from that and Andy understands but... She just wishes she'd been a little more prepared. Fighting is easy, she's come to learn, but fighting with enough skill to save those you need to is something she's yet to master.
"You did good." Inuyasha tells her, appearing out of nowhere to offer to this meager comfort.
"I feel like I could've done more."
Her half-demon shrugs and says, "Not much else you could have done, really. Too many demons and you're not familiar enough with your powers to really handle an attack on this scale. You saved people today. Sometimes that's all you can do."
"Wise words."
"Just telling you the truth."
Andy sighs heavily before turning her back to the road. Before her the remains of the village are a smoldering mess, even with the bodies gone it's still absolutely horrible to look at. They'll need to go through everything to make sure they dispose of the demon corpses. Andy doesn't know much about what happens to a demon after it dies but she assumes that some of them can still manage to survive some pretty horrific injuries should their demonic energy be strong enough. Isn't that a lovely thought? Andy grimaces as she kicks a hunk of grey muscle and magenta scales across the ground. Disgusting. Andy runs a hand through her hair to put some of her nervous energy to use. They came to this village hoping to find out something about the sacred jewel and instead all they found was carnage. Sounds about right if you ask Andy. The group's luck isn't all that great. Making her way over to where Kagome and the others are waiting, Andy wonders if there might still be something helpful hidden under the rubble and rot.
"We should probably start cleaning this place up a bit, yeah?" She asks, partly out of respect and partly because the quicker they get rid of the most obvious damage the quicker they can leave this place.
"I've found a cart. It's small and in bad shape but I think it'll suit our purposes fine." Miroku says, to which Kagome and Andy nod.
"Best start rummaging through the wreckage then." Andy grumbles, not looking forward to what's going to go into that particular task.
They split into groups pretty quickly after that. Andy and Miroku end up handling the worse part of the damage while Kagome leads Shippo off to help tidy up around the homes that aren't nearly as damaged, less chance of the kid seeing something that he probably shouldn't Andy supposes, and Inuyasha goes off to do whatever it is a half-dog demon does in this situation. It's slow going. Andy has to pull away damaged slats of wood from piles of rubble in order to find the remains of whatever demon didn't manage to flee. Handling the demon remains is so much easier than handling the remains of the humans. Less heart wrenching. Andy doesn't feel anything for the demons who were so quick to brutalize a village that had little to no protection. A chunk of what Andy believes to be torso is chucked into the broken cart along with all the other remains, coagulated blood and early stages of decay already having attracted flies and other such insects. Andy wipes her hands off on the bottom of her jeans and tries not to think about the fact that she's going to have to get rid of them because the stains are never going to wash out.
Disgusting.
Sighing, Andy tosses another slat of wood into what she's dubbed The Burn Pile and moves on to the next house. Hopefully by cleaning up the village the next generation of demon slayers - because surely those who've managed to survive will rebuild - will be able to salvage something of their old lives. Andy wouldn't necessarily recommend any of them staying in the village now that demons are aware of where it is but that's not her decision to make is it? Andy's seen a lot of horrible things in her lives - participated in a few of those horrible things too - but she's never been affected by it like the people of this village were. Another body part gets tossed in the cart. Andy moves on to another house.
Hours seem to pass before Kagome hesitantly wonders over asking if she'd like to come with them to dispose of the demon parts they've managed to gather up so far. Andy declines with the excuse that she can clean and look for something that might help them with their Jewel problem. Kagome reaches out to squeeze her hand once before turning and making her way over to the cart where Miroku and the others are waiting for her. They leave pretty quickly, Inuyasha guiding the cart with little difficulty despite the face that one of the wheels is clearly broken. Andy watches them go for a moment before turning back to her previous tasks of tossing wood into piles that will soon join one big pile further away from the homes so as not to catch anything else on fire and cause more damage than there already is. Andy thinks it'll be good practice for her. You know, starting the fire with her powers or whatever. She's been practicing a bit since waking up in Kaede's home after everything went down with her other self. Calling fire is still a little tricky, Andy's found that while her shield and the little white orbs are relatively simple it's the fire that's going to be her biggest challenge. Setting things ablaze while the others are gone probably isn't her best idea but it's certainly better than accidentally setting one of her friends on fire.
Andy drags a long slat of wood out into the open and tosses it on the ground.
This happens several more times before Andy has a satisfactory pile of burnable wood.
Crouching down so she can place one hand on the wood, Andy closes her eyes and imagines the wood going up in flame. It's the only thing she allows herself to think about and soon she's lulled into something of a meditative state. Everything around her seems to drown out, with nothing but the feel of the wood beneath her fingers and the strange sizzle of something in her body keeping her grounded. There's a woosh and then something is licking at her fingers. When Andy opens her eyes she finds a little flame eating at the kindling, growing stronger and larger the longer it's left to feed upon the board. She walks away so she can grab more boards to toss into the fire once it's really gotten going. It's tedious work, but mindless. Andy appreciates that she doesn't have to think about how to get the job done in order to actually go about doing it. Gather boards and chunks of wood, throw said items into the fire, make sure fire doesn't spread. Easy.
Bit by bit the village becomes less of a mess. Andy tosses anything of little value into the fire and when she comes across the occasional demon remain she tosses that in too. The smell is atrocious but who cares about that really? Andy's certain she's smelled worse. Still, demon remains aren't the nicest smelling things in the world and just about the time Andy is considering getting creative with what she throws in the fire to mask the scent her group returns... along with a clearly injured young woman.
"What happned?" Andy asks, motioning toward the girl slung over Inuyasha's shoulder like a rag doll.
"Naraku." is his clipped response as he brushes passed her on his way to one of the houses.
Andy shares a concerned look with Kagome before rushing after the silver haired half-demon. She reaches him just about the same time he decides on a house and she's quick to clear a space before motioning for Inuyasha to place his injured charge on the slightly damaged tatami mat she's got spread out over the floor. Once he's set the girl down Andy goes about carefully removing her bodysuit - armor? it feels like some sort of armor, not quite fabric-y enough to be regular clothing - and weapons, all of which she places in a pile to the girl's left.
The girl's skin is sickly pale, the kind of pale that comes with blood loss or incredible pain, and Andy's going to blame that on the horribly tended to wounds peppering the girl's back. Deep, festering things they are. Andy flips the girl over as gently as she can and prods a wound, only to grimace at the gush of white-yellow puss that seeps from the wound.
"Inuyasha go get some water, Kagome I'm going to need you to boil it and get some bandages out, antiseptic too." Andy tells the two people hovering beside her.
"Can't you just, you know," Inuyasha wiggles his fingers in at the girl's back and And presses her lips together.
"I will... I want to get the wounds cleaned up first and check for anything else. The last wounds I treated weren't nearly as bad as this." Andy admits.
"You saved a man from bleeding out after he lost his leg." Inuyasha points out, much to Andy's annoyance.
"And that man wasn't riddled with infection and fever." Kagome snaps back before Andy can.
Inuyasha is quick to disappear after that and once he's gone Kagome digs into her backpack for bandages and antiseptic.
"Can you help her?" Kagome asks, timid and afraid.
Andy nods and says, "I think so. I've done so much today that I'm not sure how far I can push the healing process right now... it might take a few days for everything to take affect."
The heat radiating off the girl's back ins't a pleasant sort of heat. Infection, especially in this time, can kill a person just as well as about anything else should it be left untreated. Hell. Even when it's treated infection can still be devastating to the body. Right now Andy's top priority is burning out the infection. After she does that she'll work on speeding up the healing process of her wounds but with as unskilled as she is Andy doesn't know if that's going to work or not. Broken bones and minor cuts are one thing, but with all the injuries she's healed today and the shielding and the fire starting? Andy's not entirely sure she's got enough in her to heal this girl all at once. But she'll try, because not trying isn't an option for anyone right now. Andy settles her hands over the worse wound in the girl's back and pushes her magic forward. Burning the infection away is surprisingly difficult. It's gotten into bloodstream, and while not far enough along to cause sepsis it's clear to Andy that whoever attempted to heal her the first time wasn't actually... trying. Andy's almost forced to wonder if the person who found her in this state did everything in their power to push the infection along. Inuyasha said Naraku was involved and this girl definitely wasn't part of their group before mere minutes ago. Andy shakes away the thought. There'll be time to think about this later. Right now she needs to focus on getting the infection out of this girl's body and her wounds properly bandaged.
Minutes pass before Andy's comfortable enough with the girl's current state of health to pull away. She feels good though, like she go ahead and heal the girl's body completely but... God. She's so sick. Andy's afraid that pushing her body to a state of health would do her more harm than good. So she helps Kagome put antiseptic on the wounds - hopefully the girl isn't allergic to anything they're using - and then props the girl up while Kagome covers her in band aids and gauze. Once she's gone Andy hoists the girl up so Kagome can spread out a sleeping bag for the girl to lay on to offer a bit of added comfort. With as battered as her body is Andy's half-tempted to throw a couple of blankets down as well. The two of them arrange the girl on her belly with her head facing the door and her weapons within sight so she sees them when she wakes and doesn't freak out, then they leave to join the others.
Neither Miroku or Inuyasha look pleased.
"What happened?" Andy demands in quiet tones so as to not rouse the injured girl should her hearing be sharp enough to pick out her voice.
"Naraku orchestrated all of this," Miroku begins when it's clear Inuyasha won't. "He got the best slayers out of the village so that it would be defenseless and proceeded to slaughter them. Sango is the only survivor of the attack, Naraku used her desire for vengeance against her."
"Let me guess, he sent her after you?"
"Gave her a jewel shard and everything." Inuyasha tacks on.
Andy scowls. Leave it to someone like Naraku to twist someone's grief into something dark.
"Alright, well, she's not in good shape. Infection for into her blood, I managed to burn it away but I was afraid what anymore healing would do to her body. We're going to have to keep watch over the next day or two to make sure she doesn't relapse or get worse." Andy tells the group, all of whom look uncomfortable but nod anyway.
"Do you think she'll be alright?" Shippo asks.
"After a day or two she'll be fine, physically anyway."
None of them want to bring up the fact that the loss of her family and her village will likely play havoc on her psyche. PTSD isn't exactly a well addressed topic, it's hardly addressed in the modern era, but Andy has no doubt that it's gonna be something this girl has to deal with. Andy pushes her hair out of her face before setting up a sort of watch schedule. Seeing as Inuyasha, Shippo, and Andy have the best hearing out of the group they decide to take the first few watches so that they can keep an eye on her breathing through the night, after them Kagome and Miroku will keep an eye on her. Andy thinks that occasionally during the watches she'll have to come in and offer little tweeks to the girl's healing but that shouldn't be too hard. Easier than doing everything at once and maybe sending her body into shock or something equally as awful.
With nothing left to do - and Shippo taking first watch over the injured woman - the group sets about their earlier task of gathering up demon remains and burnable debris, all of which gets tossed into the fire Andy set up hours ago. They won't be able to burn everything tonight but they've knocked out enough of the rubble that there are clear paths through the village. As the sun begins set water is gathered, supper is made, and the group gathers in front of the home they've set the injured woman up in. Everyone's pretty somber that night. Inuyasha even keeps him mutterings about finding Naraku and gathering shards to a quiet minimum much to everyone's surprise. Andy feels bad about that. Why wouldn't Inuyasha be capable of compassion despite his anger for Naraku and his desire for the jewel shards? Sighing, Andy slips into the house to check on their new charge.