Author's note: freakishdust1 – don't worry, this arc with him getting to understand Enju ends this chapter, finally

Admiral Crow – glad to hear you're enjoying it. I hope I won't disappoint with the way this story is heading.

CraiDark – Also, glad to hear you like it. Sadly, while I don't want to get your hopes down, Tina will only make an appearance at the end, in a couple of chapters, and she'll be there more for comedic purposes than to further to story. I like Tina a lot, I just didn't really see her getting that much involved with the current scenarios. Still, I hope you'll enjoy the few scenes I will write about her!

On to the story, now!

A glimpse into the past, part 6: this part of this fanfiction details events that had happened before the time series covered by the anime. Basically, this is a prequel, happening before the anime and before the non-"A glimpse into the past" chapters of this fanfiction as well.

~Ueno Onshi Park, one year before current events~

Enju: "What…..do you mean by that?" she asked, now in a truly confused state. He stared at her almost like she was crazy, still in disbelief at how incredibly ignorant she had been up until that point. How can she not have known what should have been so plainly obvious? To some extent, he was evidently at fault since, as her Promoter, he was expected to talk with her about the background info on her that he had received from the facility but, in his defense, he had always assumed that these were all things that she had been told before meeting with him. Clearly that was a wrong assumption to make, though.

Rentarō: "I mean to say that she's….not among us anymore. You won't be able to find her, no matter how hard you'll search!" it felt like he had just opened a very nasty can of worms, since now he probably inadvertently initiated a very awkward and heavy conversation. A conversation that he had no interest in partaking in.

Enju: "How….do you know that though?" the girl still looked at him, not even once averting her eyes from him. She didn't look sad or even angry yet. She was just looking at him like he was speaking in a new strange and esoteric language that she could not decipher at all. It was like the words coming from his mouth made no sense to her brain, even though she could actually understand him. It was more equivalent to someone confronting a random stranger and telling them to their face that they are in fact a lizard and not a human. Obviously nobody would get emotional or sad at that; their first reaction would be just pure disbelief.

The boy, seeing how he had already dived too deep into this topic, sighed very heavily, realizing that he was now going to have to go into some very unpleasant details. He lamented how unfortunate he was that day.

Rentarō: "Enju….I assume you know that your mother was infected with the Gastrea Virus, right? Otherwise, you wouldn't have been born as a Cursed Child in the first place!" he tried to start a logical thread for her to follow.

Enju: "What….does that have to do with anything?" she clearly didn't get what he was hinting at so he continued.

Rentarō: "Your mother was infected. And unlike Cursed Children, like you, normal humans can't live very long after becoming infected with that virus. In fact, she died only a couple of days after giving birth to you, due to severe complications from the disease that happened because of her weakened state back then! Her body was already exhausted from child birth so she couldn't surviv-…." but he was quickly interrupted.

Enju: "How do you know that?! How can you be so sure of it?!", still the girl demanded her proof, still not believing a single thing he was saying. However, there was one thing that he did achieve, and that was apparently to anger her. She now looked at him with angry eyes, clearly indicating that she wasn't going to simply believe him. She was now angry at him simply for saying such things about her mother. He clearly hit a sensitive cord now.

Rentarō: "I'm sure of this simply because all mothers of Cursed Children die very soon after becoming infected, either before or after giving birth. Even if what I said now wasn't true, your mother surely wouldn't have survived all these years with the virus in her body since then. All humans eventually succumb to the disease. This is just a reality. Moreover, this is information I got from your profile folder, which is usually verified against official citizen databases. I very much doubt anything I learned there is wrong!" he tried to justify his viewpoints.

The girl stood there, trying to digest all of the information that she had learned from him. She wasn't willing to believe it, though. Even if the majority of the words he had used were far too technical and advanced for her to understand, she did get the gist of it. And despite her trying to pretend like this wasn't the case, at the end of the day, he did have some good points to bring.

The girl glared at him, thinking up any holes in his theories that she could use to deny the plausibility of those claims.

Enju: "What if they're wrong, though? You didn't see her die with your own eyes, did you?!" he was feeling exasperated at this point. How long would it take him to convince her that she was simply wrong?

Never before had he ever considered that the information that he had received from them to be false. It was far more plausible for her to be wrong in her simply biased and completely baseless belief of the contrary. After all, what proof did she have of her mother still being alive? None! It just felt like she was a sad and defeated child in denial. And it was pitiful to him.

Enju: "I don't believe you! Just because they told you she's dead doesn't mean that it's true!" she was clearly being unreasonable, something which he heavily disliked. What point was there even in lying to her? What would he achieve from doing that? He had better things to do than that, obviously.

Rentarō: "Enju….you're not making a good case for yourself right now! You say that she's still alive somewhere, yet you're the one who isn't providing any good evidence for that! As for the I.I.S.O.'s claims, I'm sure that they're true! I was at the cemetery where all those infected with the virus get their names marked at, here in Tokyo. I saw her gravestone there!". It was obvious that she simply didn't believe him since she was in denial. It seemed like she simply was refusing all logic whatsoever, still clinging to a belief that she probably constructed as a child for herself despite clear evidence that all of her hopes are just fantasies.

Enju: "Anyone can make a gravestone with any name on it! That's not proof!" she was simply not budging from her stance. She was dead set on the belief that her mother was still somewhere, waiting for her. "A name on a rock doesn't mean anything! Until I see her body, I won't believe it!" suddenly, something snapped in him.

A memory…..a really old memory from deep within himself, many years ago, back when he was younger, even younger than how Enju was then.

~Flashback, 10 years before~

Kikunojō: "I still don't understand it! Why do you incessantly deny what is believed by everyone else to be fact? You can't live your life surrounded in self-invented lies, Rentarō!" the older man, already fed up with the child's tantrums, began to exclaim. "Everyone tells you the same thing: you'll only end up hurting yourself even more by denying it all. Reality won't bend to your will just because you want it to! Life isn't that convenient!" he scolded the six year old boy who had his back turned to the old man. Clearly, Rentarō had no intention of backing down though. He wasn't even willing to turn his back around and face the man he was talking to.

Rentarō: "You don't know that! Nobody does! I know that they're alive, somewhere!" the boy replied simply and directly, without so much as even a single doubt in his voice. He was, for all intents and purposes, convinced by whatever supernatural power that he was right and everyone else was wrong. And he wasn't going to accept any compromise on the 'truth' that he believed in, despite all the evidence to the contrary that was being presented.

Kikunojō: "(sigh) What an insolent child…." the head of the Tendō family noted, very annoyed. It felt like he was arguing with a wall, and a particularly impudent wall as well.

The boy then made a motion to suggest that he was going to walk out and leave the man behind, already fed up. In truth, he was just being disobedient for the sake of hammering in his opinions down the older man's throat. Kikunojō was a very strict man, so it wasn't frequent for Rentarō to so bluntly disrespect and disobey him. But, at the end of the day, this was one of the very few instances when the boy simply wouldn't concede at all on the subject. He had a point of view that was rigid, and no matter what anyone else would say, he just wouldn't budge. Even the voice of reason wouldn't change his mind, apparently. How could Kikunojō handle this?

Kikunojō: "Wait!" the older man demanded. Rentarō would have easily continued to walk away, if not for the very stern intonation that the man suddenly adopted out of nowhere. "I…..have something I want to ask you!" the man then began to follow the young boy as they began to walk through the big house together, through the hallway.

Rentarō felt very awkward allowing the man to follow him but didn't explicitly ask him to leave him alone. It felt like Kikunojō had something important to say.

Kikunojō: "Why do you believe your parents are still here? What makes you so sure of this?" he questioned what should have been the first question to ask anyway. The boy felt very annoyed that the older man just wouldn't drop this subject already but he also felt, this time, that Kikunojō was actually putting in some effort in trying to understand him. This was something that he appreciated, being listened to. After all, being an orphan now, he didn't have anyone else to speak his honest thoughts to, outside the members of the Tendō family.

Maybe Kisara would be more appropriate but, at the end of the day, it didn't really matter that much to him. After all, everyone from the Tendō family didn't believe him at all….some even having gone as far as mocking him for his absurd beliefs. Kisara was the only one who wouldn't try to dissuade him from them but even she was a skeptic.

Rentarō: "I…..don't know. But why does it matter to you?" he didn't know how to answer something as basic as that. To be honest, he knew that simply using the cliched 'I just believe in it' line that most kids his age use wouldn't really cut it there, so he went instead with that.

Kikunojō then let out a sigh in desperation, feeling like he was just partaking in a lost battle now. How do you logically discuss about something that was based on illogical feelings, especially when it is with a child?

Kikunojō: "You make no attempts at even proving your claims, and yet you deny all of our more probable assertions! And then you just pretend like we're the ones who are unreasonable for not believing in you! Then again, I guess, even a child as young as yourself has the concept of faith in his instincts. You refuse to believe in logic and simply believe in what your heart tells you, even if your brain disagrees…." he finally let go of this pointless talk with the boy, realizing how silly it was for him to continue.

Rentarō raised an eyebrow, sensing how this senior had given up, with a question of his own.

Rentarō: "Do grown ups have things like that, too?" that was news to him. He always personally belied that, ultimately, no adult would ever understand him and his feelings. After all, every single one of the few adults whom he had met with in the short time after his parents' deaths always disagreed with him whenever he said that they were still alive, regardless of how much he would try to reaffirm his belief. Seeing Kikunojō, a man as stoic and logical as you could get, discuss about faith, though, was giving him hope.

Kikunojō: "Yes….we do, Rentarō. In fact, I would be lying if I said that I wasn't a hopeless believer in nonsense myself. So, to some degree, I can sympathize with you!" he let out what was probably the most surprising thing that Rentarō had ever learned, his entire life.

Rentarō: "You…..are?" came a pure astonished reply from the young boy. He had never expected to hear that from this man.

Kikunojō: "Just a couple of weeks ago….when you were still trying to sleep in what burnt house of yours and refuse our help, I was tasked with protecting Area 7 of Tokyo. It was being invaded by Gastrea left and right! Their numbers were great and we haven't set up a Monolith to protect that specific location, yet. We were greatly outnumbered, as the hoard was using the least protected part of the city to invade us. Many men were refusing to come to assist me in defending, calling it a futile attempt" he recalled, with a lot of dread in his voice while recollecting all those unhappy events that had transpired not that long ago.

Rentarō: "And? What did you do, then? Why weren't you afraid?" the boy, now intrigued, asked the older man.

Kikunojō: "To be honest, I was afraid. But I knew that leaving out territory from our city to the enemy would only cause overcrowding and a whole lot of other issues for us living here. Displaced citizens would have to remain homeless and live in poverty, only decreasing our productivity and our chances of re-establishing a proper economy. So, even though I knew that the chances of us winning that battle were ridiculously low, I knew we had no other choice in the matter!" he calmly told the small child.

Rentarō: "You…..agreed to go in a battle in which you knew you would die?" obviously he missed the point entirely. "Then, how are you still alive right now?"

Kikunojō: "Faith is what helped me! It is something that, even if illogical, you can use to override the rational side of your brain when that side is the one telling you that you should just give up. When done in the wrong circumstances, recklessly jumping into battle is insanity. That battle was hopeless, indeed, especially since very few would join me in defending what was rightfully our territory! But, even with the few men that did help me, even when we were outnumbered by the Gastrea five to two, we still pulled through! It wasn't because we were afraid of dying or were good at what we did, but that everyone who was there, including me, truly knew that we had to win. Knowing that you must not lose, the only thing you can do to help yourself is to have faith that you will win, even if there is no basis for that. It was that confidence that allowed us to perform as well as we did!" even though he was a very cold and calculated man, Kikunojō actually felt, for the very first time, like a grandfather telling a story to his grandchild. Even though Rentarō was too young to know how to appreciate that, he was still, ultimately, impressed by that tale.

Kikunojō: "In the end, Rentarō, I had faith in our victory, and our victory rewarded our beliefs with its coming to fruition, that day! It was truly illogical and yet we triumphed!" he proudly stated, with a calm yet warming smile on his face.

Rentarō: "Does that mean you believe in my story, now, Kikunojō-san?" the boy asked, sheepishly.

Kikunojō: "No….I don't!" came the incredibly cold yet sober reply from the older man, slamming the boy's hopes back into the ground. "But I understand why you refuse to listen to reason. After all, it would only be hypocritical of me to speak badly of those that are just as hopeless as I was" apparently, the boy now would have to be satisfied with just that.

It felt like a cop out, yes, but the boy was happy just to receive this much acknowledgment from his usually stubborn and no-nonsense elder.

Kikunojō: "I won't continue to press on you with beliefs that aren't yours. I just hope that, one day, you will wise up and realize how futile it is to believe in senseless dreams. Then again, maybe you are right, after all. Who knows?" he conceded, making the boy proud of himself for having won a debate with none other than the head of the Tendō family himself.

Kikunojō: "Do, remember this, Rentarō!" however, before he finally dropped this subject, the man came back with one final thing to say: "Faith isn't something you can explain, it is something that is meant to soothe the soul's wounds. When men are crying in despair, faith may realistically be the only thing that can make their lives less miserable!"

~End of flashback~

Rentarō: "So….I really was this pathetic back then too, huh?" now he understood Kikunojō more than he had ever before. He wanted to say that he was above this small girl crying her eyes out, that she was just an animal that was acting violently and irrationally because she was let loose on society. But, when all is said and done, he finally realized that, if he was the one that would have been sealed up in a single building for most of his life, with her powers, only to be released for a couple of days, he probably would have committed the same atrocities as her, if not worse.

The girl was whimpering, trying to climb back up to stand on her two legs but the bullet wounds would prevent her from doing that. She felt like a chicken with her legs tied with a string, flailing its wings wildly to get back up, only to pathetically fall back onto the ground and squirm in the dirt.

Enju: "It's just not fair! None of this is fair! I'm finally out of that place, finally able to look for her, and now you're sending me back! It's not fair! I want to meet mommy! I want to spend at least one night with her, to have her tuck me in bed and kiss me good night!" she let out, as the tears and snot were invading her screaming mouth. The girl didn't care at all, by that point, anymore. She just wanted to run away from this man, to escape him and reach the freedom she needed in pursuing her now seemingly futile goal.

Rentarō didn't shoot her for trying to escape, as he had previously promised. There was no need for that, since she was so vulnerable and pathetic on the ground, not even able to get up and run, that it felt pointless to continue to injure her, now.

Instead, what he did, was something which even he didn't expect, as his body began to move on his own.

He lunged at the girl, pulled her with his arms open into him, embracing her from behind, in a forced hug.

Enju stood there, her face puffed up and red from all the crying and wailing that she had done, feeling human warmth in her back for the first time in years. Never before had she ever experienced that kind of affection before.

Baffled, she didn't even know how to react. Her first instinct was to try to struggle away but, given how exhausted her body already was, she felt like it would be pointless now. Instead, the only thing she could say was the following:

Enju: "Why?"

Rentarō: "I'm sorry, Enju! I'm really sorry!" he wasn't going to argue with her anymore, nor yell at her or threaten her. Instead, he was simply going to lie there, holding her like that, until she would calm down.

And, surprisingly, Enju stopped struggling completely after that too, simply standing there and crying all her sadness out while Rentarō would keep her in his arms, supporting her collapsed body.

It felt so wrong for both of them to be like that, especially since their relationship had been so rocky the past couple of days. And yet, despite their arguments and conflicts, at that moment, for those few couple of minutes that they were like that, they finally felt the reinvigorating sense of human affection that both of them so desperately needed.

~Evening that day~

Rentarō: "What a horrendous day….." he told himself after confirming that the SMS that he had received from Miyori was correct. Yes, he will have to date her very soon and there was no renegotiating of the locations she desired for them to attend. "Sometimes, being popular with women isn't that great…." he told himself disingenuously. That was only a joke for himself since it was due to her interventions that he was still with Enju now and not in court yet for the latter's misdeeds.

Rentarō: "Oh...speaking of Enju…." he had almost forgotten about her. Since they had arrived back to his home he had placed the poor girl in her bed. At this point, after having worked so hard in fixing that bed, he had almost sworn not to allow her to sleep in his parents' room anymore although, after the crap that they both endured that day, he thought it wasn't that major of a priority anymore.

After that horrible altercation with the police, the girl couldn't walk anymore on her legs due to the bullets that she had received, which left her impaired. Thankfully those bullets were not made out of Varanium as only Promoters are allowed to use the said substance in their armaments and, consequently, she should be able to heal those woulds. However, since she was already badly hurting from a Varanium shrapnel embedded in her shoulder blade, her healing powers were already impaired and, as such, she couldn't start walking yet. Which meant that Rentarō had to carry her back to his house on his back.

He had left Enju to sleep in his parents' bed yet again and left her alone to sleep and heal herself. She was most likely exhausted after the ordeals she had to endure.

And, since then, she had spent the next couple of hours alone. Maybe he should have brought her into the hospital instead and have the doctors there look at her but, given the circumstances, he was sure he couldn't justify her injuries and the presence of those bullets in her legs to them in any way. Miyori's intervention saved them from further police inquiries but he didn't want to force his luck and test the limits of her influence. There was only so much she could help him get away with and so, sadly, the only viable solution is rely on Enju's inherent Gastrea healing abilities to repair her wounds without the need for medical attention. He had disinfected and bandaged her gunshot wounds before leaving her to rest so he hoped things would have improved after that.

Now he wanted to check up on her. He approached his parents' room slowly, careful not to make too much noise in case she was still sleeping.

He cracked open the door to the dark room and noticed a huge lump underneath the blankets, slowly lowering and rising back the cover in rhythm with usual breathing. It was quiet, so quiet that he was sure that the girl was sleeping. Still, he needed to be sure.

He approached the bed, switched on the lamp light and then he placed his hand on the bulge, slowly shaking it to awaken the girl underneath.

Rentarō: "Enju!" he said lowly, to pull the girl back to a woken state.

Enju: "Leave me alone!" she immediately responded, in such a weak tone he could almost mistake that for a whisper. She didn't seem to have the energy to raise her voice, her shallow one only neutering what should have been an imperative tone but which came out sounding more like begging.

Rentarō: "I will. But I wanted to make sure that you're feeling well" that felt so out of place given how aggressive he had been with her up until that day that the shift in attitude was nothing less than eerily suspicious.

Enju: "How do you think I feel? I was shot!" she was grumpy, to say the least. Then again, he couldn't really blame her. He couldn't even imagine how it must have hurt her.

Rentarō: "Do you want some food? I just finished cooking dinner!" he tried to calm the girl and offer a truce with her so that she could begin to open up to him once again.

Enju: "I'm not hungry" unsurprisingly that was not enough to manipulate her into forgiving him. "Go eat by yourself! You don't wanna be with me anyway!" that was unwelcome, even for him. Her apathy for spending time with him was obvious and Rentarō knew that this damage had only been caused by his own actions. He deserved this treatment from her. Hell, if he had been in her place, he was sure he would have been just as spiteful after what had occurred.

Rentarō: "(sigh) I said I'm sorry!" he didn't have anything else to say to convince the girl that he was regretting everything.

Enju: "You say that but you'll still send me to that facility back, aren't you? You don't care what'll happen to me, do you? You just want me out of your life!" the conversation was only devolving the more it continued on. Rentarō wanted to say that she was wrong but he knew that he had lost her trust. Still, he had one thing prepared to tell her.

Rentarō: "I spoke with Kisara-san on the phone two hours ago. I told her that I want to keep you as my Initiator…." he declared proudly, which shattered the girl's expectations suddenly.

Enju stood there for a second, digesting what she had received. Was this a good thing? Can she even believe such a story, especially from him? Rentarō had been a horrible Promoter since he took her in but, if there was one thing he didn't display any signs of since then, it was that of a liar.

Enju: "Why….?" was all she could ask, even though she knew that she was at fault for all the stuff that had happened that day just as much as him. She didn't want to admit guilt of her own but, deep down, she knew she was also to blame so his reveal that he won't send her back anymore was a bit of a shock.

Rentarō: "Because none of what happened was just your fault. I admit, I got carried away and I forgot to give you the time to adjust…." that was sudden and the girl didn't know how to take that. Was he finally opening back up to him? She was too scared to trust him now, after what had happened.

Enju: "You said you were gonna shoot me, though! You even looked like you were ready to! And now you expect me to believe you?!" the boy gulped. It was hard for him to deny any of that. Admittedly, he was ready to shoot back there but, when he had said that, he wasn't prepared to actually kill her. The intentions behind that warning was to scare her into not running away anymore and, even in the event that she would attempt to, him shooting would only be to incapacitate her. But, obviously, he couldn't expect her to trust him on that.

Rentarō: "Yes, I did. It was never meant to kill you, though. I guess….I went a bit too far…" he said that as if that was supposed to give any real consolations. Any man shooting a girl of her age would undoubtedly go to prison for what he had done. Hell, even threatening a child with shooting them, like he had done, would land them in prison. The only reason that was not the case there was that this went unreported due to Miyori's intervention and, even then, it would not have been possible had Enju not been a Cursed Child.

Due to the double standards that existed in Japanese society against Cursed Children, it was possible for Rentarō to get away with what he did to his own Initiator. And, ironically, it was those exact double standards that he despised the most. And yet now he relied on them to continue functioning as a Promoter.

Enju: "Gee, you think?" she wanted to be way more vindictive but, looking back at it, she had to admit that she was also a bit at fault. Still, she wasn't going to just admit that. "Why are you being like this now? What do you have to gain from being nice to me all of a sudden?" clearly she wasn't giving up on her "bad Rentarō" rhetoric so he just had to change the way he was approaching this.

Rentarō: "I'm not trying to gain anything back, except for your trust. I won't be able to do my job without you, Enju!" he tried to take a step back and provide her with logical explanations now since apologies didn't seem to work on her anymore. "And besides…..I know how it feels to miss your mother".

The girl tensed at that sentence.

Enju: "Oh….do you?" she sarcastically replied, in a mocking voice. Rentarō decided not to reprimand her for that.

Rentarō: "Enju….I lost my parents just like you did, ten years ago. They were taken away from me before I was even old enough to know what I wanted to become when I would grow to be an adult" he began recalling those memories. "The burning house that was left would be their gravestones. And I had to cope with the fact that their deaths were just a bunch of numbers that described the amount of fatalities during the Great War, with everyone else forgetting about their existence except for the Tendō family" the girl was still listening to him, despite being a little annoyed that he still chose to be there with her and actively disregard her previous insistence of him leaving her room.

Rentarō: "I still don't think, to this day, that they are dead. Everyone else counted them as such and the official conclusion was that they could never have survived the ordeal" he continued on. "But I never gave up on my beliefs and I pledged to find them, wherever they are, even if it will take me my entire life. I believed in that back then just as you do now with your mother, even after everyone told me that my hopes were in vain" that was a bit unexpected.

She didn't know if to trust him or not. Maybe this story was just a means of manipulating her. How could she tell the truth from lies when she barely even knew this man? And yet he, as her Promoter, knew so much about her life just from her files. It wouldn't be outside the realm of possibility for him to try to use lies and fiction to fabricate a story very similar to her life to try to gain her loyalty.

Enju: "And yet this house is still in one piece, apparently…." she pointed out one inconsistency that stood out to her.

Rentarō: "Yes, the Tendōs did that. After having the house be burned to a crisp they invested the money to rebuild it back to how it was, to some extent. Even though they changed the architecture a bit, they did a great job with it. I'm forever indebted to Kisara-san and her family for what they had done for me" was his explanation.

Enju: "I guess you have many friends, don't you?" that comment felt bitter but, again, he didn't remark on that.

Rentarō: "I do! Kisara-san and Miyori-san are both amazing and I owe them so much for their support. I even know this genius doctor that you may get to meet if you choose to continue to be my Initiator!" again, an unexpected comment.

Enju: "What do you mean by that? I don't get to choose anything!" she angrily replied, a bit ticked off by what seemed as dishonesty from his part.

Rentarō: "I understand if you don't want to work with me anymore after what happened today. Honestly I don't think I'll ever be able to make up to you for what I did. So I'll give you the choice of whether you want to trust me again and continue to work as my Initiator or not" Enju was genuinely intrigued by that for a second. That was something she never thought she would hear a Promoter say to his Initiator.

Enju: "And if I choose to not trust you then you'll send me back to that facility, aren't you?" that was a valid concern. It wasn't going to be easy for her to return there since then she would have to redo the Initiator Training Program to qualify again for her job and wait for another Promoter to be assigned to her which could end up taking years. She did not want to go through the nightmares that she had to go through just to wait for another Promoter to pop up into her life and then see if things would work out better with him or her.

Rentarō: "Not necessarily…." he surprised her once again. "I spoke with Kisara-san and asked her if she was fine with taking you in instead" the girl immediately rose from underneath the blanket that was covering her entire body, all red from her skin rash but also from the warmth of having spent so many hours in there.

Enju: "Wait? You mean I don't have to go back to that facility?!" finally, he captured her attention. She had a renewed spark of life in her eyes, which was so refreshing to see. It was heartwarming, even for him.

Rentarō: "Yes….I am. She's a good woman and she can take good care of you; probably better care than I can ever do" Enju's face was lightning up once again with pure childish optimism although with uncertainty once again.

Enju: "But…..what will happen to you then?" she asked, a bit confused. "Don't you need me to continue to work at your job? I thought Promoters and Initiators can't be split that easily" she recalled what she had overheard from Kisara's and his own conversation earlier that day.

Rentarō: "I'll have to resign my job afterwards…." came a rather sudden bomb that she had never expected. "Technically you are the property of Kisara's company and, as such, if I resign then you get to stay at her company and become the Initiator of whomever will come to replace me or, even be her own Initiator. She also has a Promoter license, after all" even being as young as she was, she already understood what it probably must have meant for him to resign.

Enju: "Then…..if you won't be a Promoter anymore….what will you do?" for a second she sounded genuinely sad and concerned for him.

Rentarō: "No….that's not what I meant to say! I will still try to find myself a job at a different Civil Security office. Then again, I already have an offer from Miyori so it probably won't take me that long to find a new employer…." the girl stood there, taken aback. He was willing to give up his job just for her. Even if she didn't understand the value of money as an adult would, it was still quite surprising to hear such a thing.

She thought that Initiators were dispensable, much like the Black Bullets that Promoters would use. Why would he go through these hardships just to make her happy? That concept was so foreign that she genuinely couldn't even parse it.

Enju: "But…..why would you do that? Why do I get to choose whether you keep your job or not? Can't you just send me away like you planned to and get yourself a new partner?" he felt a bit sad that even she knew how expendable society treated her as.

Rentarō: "I could but, in the end, you suffered enough! And, after all, you're not a tool that can simply be thrown out. You're a girl! And you deserve the right to choose to be free!" that was such a strange thing to hear from this strange man that the thought of this just being a prank from him crossed her mind at that moment.

Enju: "Is he testing me right now? What should I say?!" this man's supposed livelihood depended on what she decided at that point. This was something she never expected to be capable of choosing. Could she forgive him? After all the horrible ways he had treated her those past few days? It was a difficult thing to ask.

Then again, she really wanted a friend, someone she could put her trust into, someone she could genuinely believe would be capable of protecting her while she risked her life to protect him in return. After all, this is what it meant to be a Promoter's Initiator.

Enju: "…..I'm sorry" after a bit of thinking she finally realized that it was time for her to be fair.

Rentarō: "For what?" he asked a bit taken aback at that.

Enju: "For…...you know…..everything. I should have listened to you back on the training grounds. I also should never have attacked those people at the park, I guess…." she admitted, while looking away shyly. Ironically, she said such a horrible thing with the same tone of voice that a girl of her age would admit to being found having eaten crayons.

Rentarō simply smiled all of a sudden, realizing how right he had been then to just open up to her and be honest. This was the first time since she had moved in when she apologized for anything.

Rentarō: "It's fine…..probably" he replied awkwardly. He didn't know how to respond to a girl confessing to wrongdoings so he just tried to brush that off.

Enju: "Are you still…..mad at me?" the cuteness she asked that question with stirred a sudden jolt in his heart.

Rentarō: "No…..in fact, I'm the one who should be asking you that" that soft smile of his felt more genuine than anything he had ever shown to her before. For some reason that made her feel joy, in a strange and new way.

Enju: "And…...also….sorry for peeing in the bed last night. I just had horrible nightmares" she replied suddenly.

Rentarō: "That's fine…..but has that been a problem for you in the past? Should I talk to a psychologist to hear you out?" he suddenly became concerned. The girl's face turned a bit red at that question.

Enju: "No….it's just that….I…" again, she felt a bit strange having to reveal what she was about to to this man. "I...uh…..I've been having those nightmares whenever I would sleep in an unlit room".

That was a peculiar thing for him to hear from a child like herself.

Rentarō: "Could it be…..you're afraid of the dark?" admittedly, that should have been a question that he should have addressed the moment he took her in. It's just that he had never thought about that possibility and nobody had trained him in this type of stuff either. Now that he thought about it, a lot more headaches could have been avoided if he had simply asked the right questions at the right time. Sadly, he was never one to have good foresight.

Enju simply nodded in response to that.

Enju: "Back at the I.I.S.O, some time ago, they put me…..in a room when I was at that facility. They kept me in there for an entire day supposedly. It was…...really dark. And quiet. And….and…..I saw…...visions of horrible stuff in it" her voice began shaking at the recollection of those events. She could still vividly remember those horrifying mental images. "Those dreams felt so palpable…..I can still see them when I'm alone. Even immediately after I wake up screaming, if I'm in a dark room, I just see the afterimages in front of me, even while fully awake. I…...can't control myself" tears began to form in her eyes, when remembering that. "It was so lonely and cold…..I'm still scared" suddenly she looked at him pleadingly, even more so than ever before.

Enju: "Please….Rentarō, I know you have no obligation to do this for me but…..could you please sleep with me for a little bit? Even with the night light on I don't think I can-…." but he suddenly hugged her out of nowhere.

Rentarō: "It's fine! I will sleep by your side until you'll feel comfortable again to be in bed by yourself" suddenly, she knew, after hearing that, that he warmed up to her once again. It was a small gesture and a small sacrifice for him to make for her sake. But it was still a nice one to make. "And don't worry for that peeing thing. I won't be mad at you anymore if you do it again" he still can't believe he said that but, to some extent, he still felt that he needed to say that. It felt like the only fair thing for him to say considering that apparently she didn't have as much control over it as he would have hoped. If she had been traumatized by whatever happened to her in the past, then it would be unfair for him to punish her over the aftereffects of that.

Rentarō: "Did they…..ever do any other horrible things to you? Back at the facility I mean" realizing that she was now open up to him again, he realized that maybe then was a good moment to start having serious discussions and find out more about each other.

Enju: "Yes…..they beat me. After keeping me in that dark cell, they beat me really hard…" she cried, still trying to suppress those memories. "Ever since then the left side of my mouth hurts…." that was a bad sign.

Rentarō: "It….does? Wait, was that why you couldn't eat cereal this morning?!" now it was all coming together.

Enju: "Yes…..I told you my mouth hurts! You didn't believe me!" she accused him, rightly. The boy now felt even worse about himself for having done that.

Rentarō: "Can I…..take a look please?" he asked. The girl nodded before opening her mouth and showing him her teeth. It took him a bit to focus on the insides but eventually he found the root cause of her problem: a tooth infection and a really bad one. Apparently a tooth had been dislodged out of its socket many months or even years ago and the open wound eventually got infected and that area around it became swollen.

Rentarō: "What…..did they do to you?" he asked in pure bewilderment.

Enju: "One of them hit me with his boot and sent a tooth out!" that was enough.

Now he understood what kind of life this girl must have had to endure back there. No wonder she was so antisocial with him, she had lived like a caged animal that was regularly abused.

Rentarō: "There's no way I'm sending you back there….." now he understood what he needed to do. This was a girl who had issues. Lots of issues. And instead of him acting like a responsible guardian and trying to fix them, he had been abusive towards her. How could he have been so genuinely horrible?

Rentarō: "Tomorrow…...you're going to see a dentist with me!" he suddenly declared, swearing mentally to himself never to abandon this girl ever again.

Enju: "Dentist? What's a dentist?" surprisingly she didn't even know that. The boy smiled mischievously since he knew how much of a hassle children usually make when they are told that. The fact that she was so clueless meant that he could take advantage of that and, at least for the first time, not have to deal with the struggles of convincing her to go.

It was a bit sad but if that's what it meant to be her guardian, he would have to really start becoming dedicated this time to protecting and nurturing her. Yes, she was educationally compromised for having not done any schoolwork all her life. Yes, she had no common sense and was just a couple of levels away from being a literal feral animal being brought into society. Yes, she was a bit aggressive and uncontrollable but given her circumstances, it clearly seems that she still turned up surprisingly way better than she could have.

Rentarō: "The dentist is a man that's going to give you candy if you behave yourself!" he lied cheerfully. That was obviously a lie but he had to use that.

Enju: "…." she could sense something was odd and suspicious about this but decided to not question it and simply went with it. "Uh….by the way Rentarō, I know I was the one who asked you to sleep with me but….." she began but kind of hesitated.

Rentarō: "What is it?" he became quite curious.

Enju: "I would like to sleep on your left side!" that came out of nowhere.

Rentarō: "My left side? Why is that?"

Enju: "Well, I don't want to end up touching cold metal while I sleep….." he flinched at that.

Rentarō: "That…..hurt a bit. I have feelings too, you know!" he tried to keep that in.

Enju: "What's with your arm and leg? I never got to ask you about those when we came back home" that was a topic that he didn't feel especially comfortable talking about. She remembered what she had seen on the training grounds that day when he had to use his prosthetic limbs to gain the advantage and win that fight before it escalated.

Rentarō: "Well at this point, there's no need to keep on hiding this from her" now that she had revealed her own dark secrets to him and, since this was a very odd bonding moment for both of them, he thought it was his turn to share distasteful past facts about himself to her.

Rentarō: "I….tried to protect a dear friend of mine, Kisara-san, a couple of years ago when we were attacked by a Gastrea. I managed to defend her but…..that thing….caught a good bite of my right arm and infected it. I tried to kick it away with my leg too but then it bit my leg too. Eventually, the thing dug its teeth so deep in me that I lost consciousness from the pain and passed out…." that was probably not a good story to tell to a small girl who had never had fought a real Gastrea in the past and who also had trouble sleeping by herself in the dark but it was something that he felt she should have known anyways.

Enju: "Oh…..I'm…..I'm sorry…." she didn't know how to respond to that back story. How do you respond politely to such a thing?

Rentarō: "Apparently, while I was fainted, the thing ripped my right arm and leg out before it was dispatched by soldiers. By the time I was taken to the recovery room, the only thing the doctors could do was pump adrenaline in me and give me blood to keep me alive. Needless to say, they thought I was a goner until a scientist came along and proposed to save me by sticking these Varanium prosthetic limbs as a replacement into me" that made the girl whimper a bit.

Enju: "Wait…..so you're made out of Varanium now?!" she almost cried in fear. "No offense but I don't think I'll feel comfortable sleeping with you anymore…." that was hurtful.

Rentarō: "It's just my right limbs!" he then proved his point by tapping his right arm with his left hand and making a very low pitched sound, like one would make when tapping a metal bar. It was a bit eerie. "Besides, as long as this Varanium doesn't get into your body then it shouldn't be a problem for you. It's an entire arm, not a bullet" well, that might have been true but the girl was still a bit worried. In the end, she was still vulnerable to that metal. It would definitely be bad if she got sick from being too close to those artificial appendages.

Enju: "So…..is that the only part of you that's….uh…..replaced?" she didn't know which words to use to not offend him. It was funny seeing her genuinely struggle to be careful when talking about that subject.

Rentarō: "Well, almost. There's also my left eye too" he responded stoically. "Apparently the thing shoved a claw in my eye's socket deep within my skull and-…."

Enju: "I GET IT! Please stop talking! You're freaking me out!" she was on the verge of puking. This man had his own sets of issues apparently.

Rentarō: "Rude…." was all he said in response to her interruption.

Enju: "How are you going to get married when you're a broken mess like this?" apparently she stopped caring about offending him and began speaking all of her thoughts now that she realized that she was talking to what most would probably call a cyborg.

Rentarō: "Hey….you're becoming quite annoying! It's not nice making fun of those unfortunate enough to have prosthetic limbs, you know!" he tried to scold her.

Enju: "Just try not to kill me with those things….." was her cold reply to this. "You have enough metal in you right now to probably kill me in my sleep…." that was a rather sinister thought for a child her age to have.

Rentarō: "Ditto with your legs! You have sufficient strength with those to crush my rib cage!" the girl rolled her eyes at that.

Enju: "Not with bullets in my legs, I can't!" oh yeah, he had forgotten about that.

Rentarō: "Oh…..right. Can you...uh…..walk yet?" he asked a bit worried, after having the focus of this conversation turn back on her injuries.

Enju: "No…..my legs still hurt a lot. I don't think I can stand on them yet" she revealed. "But by tomorrow they will probably heal enough for me to walk again" that was a nice thought.

Rentarō: "Do you want me to bring you the food to your bed then?" he offered immediately. He finally started being thoughtful towards her.

Enju: "Mhm" was her quick and short reply. She didn't want to be so dependent on him but that was the current state of affairs, sadly. "I'm sorry! I know you pr-…."

Rentarō: "It's fine! We're partners, after all, aren't we?" he began before realizing how he had jumped the gun for saying that and that he hadn't heard her response to his previous question.

No, they weren't partners. At least, not anymore. He had lost her trust and it was now still in the air whether they will continue their contract or not. She had always expected to never have a choice in the matter but now, now that they ended up like this, he had given her the choice of deciding whether she would choose to pair with Kisara (or a future Promoter of their company) instead of him.

Rentarō: "Uh…...wait. Do you still want us to be partners?" now it was his turn to be timid. It wasn't like him to ask this stuff like that but, now, he had to know what course of action he had to take.

Enju: "(glaring) Why? If I said 'no' now, would you leave me to starve for the rest of the night?" she began asking in an annoyed voice.

The boy froze for a second, realizing how that question wasn't timed really well and how that could have easily led to that misunderstanding.

Rentarō: "N-no" he stuttered for a second. "That wasn't what I meant! I just wanted to-…." but she chuckled all of a sudden.

Enju: "Yeah, it's fine! I was just joking…." that was the first time she did that. "Yes, I think I still want to be your Initiator! Now go give me some food...partner!"

A/N: I am so terribly sorry. I know this chapter came out way later than I could have expected (almost 2 years since the previous one). There's nothing I can say in my defense other than I hope you guys will keep on reading, whoever is still interested. Even if there will be nobody still keeping up with this story, I'll try to motivate myself to keep on working on it. The truth is, we are approaching the end of this section of the story (the Glimpse into the past section). After one more chapter, or two, I will finish this entire segment off and then I will move back into continuing the main story which I left off for too long now. I hope to at least!