"So… Daken is having another kid?" Conner asked, eyes wide as he sat on Donna's couch, staring at her baby bump. "Your sibling?"

"Yep." I said, taking another swig from the bottle of red dragon.

"And you're going to move here to help raise it?" He asked.

"Temporarily."

"And you expect me to come with you?"

I took another drink, damn this stuff was good. "I don't expect you to do anything. I know you have a team to think of, I just wanted you to know where I am, and why."

Connor nodded slowly, "You've been away for months. I miss you."

"I know Connor, and I'm sorry, but I need to stay here."

"… I'm staying too."

I stood up from the chair, walking over and kissing him on the cheek. "I love you baby, can you do me a favor?"

He smiled as I sat down next to him, "Sure, what?"

I handed him the half empty bottle, "Take this away from me. I feel tipsy, and for a girl with a healing factor, that's not a good sign."

Connor took the bottle away, "Uh, Mio? I gotta tell you something."

I laid down on the couch, my head on his lap. "What's up baby doll?"

"Wow, you are drunk." He mumbled, "Uh, look, while you were gone… something happened."

I snuggled closer to him. "Megan and me, well… we were training and she… uh, she kissed me."

My eyes flew open, and I sat up, "What?"

He reeled, "Mio, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, and I swear, I stopped the kiss immediately, and it never happened again."

I laughed, "Ha, Connor, baby, that's cute, but we both know that would never happen."

Connor stopped, "Wait… what?"

I sighed, "Connor, in every relationship ever made, there's a reacher, and a settler. The reacher goes for someone way out of their league, and the settler settles for the reacher."

He stared at me, "So… you think I'm the reacher?"

"Connor, I know you're the reacher." I said with finality. "I'm just hotter."

Connor leaned away from me, "Uh, no, I'd say we're both about the same level."

I shook my head, "You are so naïve. I'm Japanese Connor, do you know how many guys a day fantasize about Japanese girls?"

He crossed his arms, "Mio, I'm spun steel, do you know how many girls a day fantasize about a guy with my build?"

"Connor, look at my nose." I pointed to the bridge of my nose, "This right here is a small little button of a nose, perfect for kissing."

Connor held up his hands, "Mio, my hands are huge."

Donna leaned back in her chair, rubbing my baby bump, "No, you will never be as crazy as her."

I stood up, "I've got a stomach flatter than a pancake."

He stood up too, "I've got a six pack!"

"I've got model legs that go straight up to my ass!"

He turned around, "My ass is better!"

"I can pull off the Japanese school girl look!"

"I can pull off the motorcycle gangster look!"

And thus followed the biggest fight me and Connor ever had as a couple. We started out talking about how hot we were apart, but then when we ran out of good points about our physical characteristics, we started making jabs at each other.

"You have a dinosaur head!" I yelled.

"Yeah, well you're flat chested!" He snapped.

"You're to tall!"

"You're to short!"

"You have the emotional set up of a new born puppy!"

"You aren't funny!"

"You're so desperate you make up stories about other girls kissing you so that you feel better!"

"You were afraid to try to get into a relationship with me, just because you know I'm hotter, and there would be hundreds of other girls fawning over me!"

We carried on like that for hours, with Donna just watching contently as we made total jerks of ourselves.

Eventually, I came up with an idea.

We were pretty much out of things to say, until I thought of the one thing a guy just can't out do.

"I can put my leg behind my head!"

Connor stopped arguing, "Wait… what?"

Donna finally spoke up, "Mio wins."

I threw a fist up into the air, "Yes! I'm the settler!"

Connor collapsed down onto the couch, "I'm the reacher?"

Donna shrugged, "Don't feel to bad about it, I was the reacher in me and Daken's very brief relationship. All it means is that you managed to improvise, and now you're tapping that."

Connor smirked, "You know what blonde lady? You're right."

Connor grabbed me around my waste, and kissed me. "I have the most amazing girlfriend ever… but seriously, that kiss with Megan really happened."

I laughed, pulling away from him, "Sure it did Connor. But Megan would never be that stupid, because she knows I'd kill her."

I turned back to Donna, "You're okay with letting us sleep on your couch?"

She nodded, "And I've got a futon in storage you can use if that's more comfortable."

Wow. I'm going to be helping to raise a kid. I really need to get my life in order. I mean, if I really stick around this kid, I'm going to be having late nights with it, bottle feeding, sitting through stupid cartoons like Umi Zumi, or Tele Tubbies. I'm going to have to argue with daycare people, and watch as this kids goes through like, five different sports, while showing no talent for them whatsoever. I'm going to have to clap when this kid strikes out at baseball for the fourteenth time in a row. I'm going to have to go to PTA meetings. I'm going to have to pay for windows broken with base balls, for vandalism to train cars… I have to endure the teenager phase, when all they do is yell at you, pop pimps, and make bad choices.

I'm beginning to see why Daken walked out. This is some scary stuff!

Mio, no! You are not backing out of this, or everything you've fought for these last few years, everything you told Daken at that bar, it will mean nothing.

Mama wanted me to be the Red Dragon, I can start by teaching that kid.

But I can't raise a child! As big of an idiot as I am, I'm going to wind up forgetting to feed it or something! It'll go wander out into the road one day and we'll never get it back!

What was I thinking!? I'm sixteen, I can't raise a child! I wanna go home! I want Logan! I want him to make me do overtime in the danger room! I want to fix motorcycles with him!

"Mio?" Donna asked, speaking up, "Are you okay?"

I shook my thoughts away, "Uh, what?"

"You just had this look on your face… it's the same one Daken had before he left." She explained, one hand over her baby bump.

I was actually considering leaving Donna? I am the most selfish person in the world. "I'm not leaving Donna, I'm gonna stick around, see how this kid turns out."

But I better put my past behind me first.

TWO DAYS LATER:

I sat in one side of the Catholic confession box, the holy man on the other side. "Bless me father, for I have sinned. I have spent the last six years, becoming a weapon, and killing innocent people. I hurt my adopted sister Lovette. I crushed my mother's heart. I was called a monster by my own father, who qualified as a demon from hell, so he really had no room to judge. I've lied, cheated, manipulated, been in fights and massacres that had nothing to do with me. I was in them just for the sake of killing and murder. I fell in love with a terrible person, who broke my heart, and I had the nerve to be sad for myself, with all the evil I've done. But I'd like to make amends."

Now this was LA, so Catholic Priests are very used to hearing much worse than what I just said. And no matter what sins you confess to, they're inclined to give you forgiveness, no matter what.

"God says all sins are forgivable, and once you are forgiven, that is the end. He forgets your sins, and never remembers. You get a fresh slate."

What a load of crap! Do you honestly believe an all powerful omnipresent being is just going to watch you sin, forgive you, watch you sin, forgive you, watch you sin, and then forgive you in an endless cycle? Sure, if you're really sorry, and you actually put forth all your effort into never doing it again, but if you just half heartedly ask 'forgive me' with no intention of really stopping, He's not going to even pay attention to you!

I wiped away sweat form my forehead, "Bless me father-" I grabbed the screen separating the two of us, smirking into the priest's face, "And don't mind the grin. I remember every kill, every sin over the course of my life. There was a family of Mormons, I killed all of them. A woman in Paris. A few kids in Japan, I'm not sure if I did it, but I might have. Memory isn't to clear right now. A man in London and his five year old niece. About eight people in Hong Cong, ages from mid thirties to about twenty, or even late teens."

He looked ready to scream.

"But I never practiced prostitution, ever!" I forced, "I killed a few, but I never did it. You live a life a chastity, and you must really look at scum like me, and wonder what snaps inside of us, what happens to us in our life that turns us into complete monsters. So bless me father, because I've sinned, and enjoyed every moment of it. I can still remember the blood, and the screams, and the animal inside of me lusting for blood." I stood up, turning my chair to face the little window, "So here we go again, I'm sorry. I'm a terrible person. In St. Louis, I kidnapped a girl and cut her head off, then sent a video of it to her parents."

"In Iraq, I played cards with the gaggle of mercenaries with shot guns. I caught one of them cheating, killed all of them, and strung their gizzards out on a clothing line for everyone to see. Fair enough, right?" I bit my thumb nail, "I think that at one of their funerals, I snuck up behind his now widowed wife, stabbed her in the back, and pushed her into the hole. Everyone just kind of ran away after that. My motto back then was to kill, live for the moment, and take my pleasures where I could."

I'm pretty sure he just urinated.

"And well, now I've decided that I'm done with all of that. So, even though our opinions on God are greatly varying, you're a holy man, and I'm responsible for a little child now."

"You are pregnant?"

"Nah, my dad knocked up another woman, then walked out on her. I'm gonna help her get back on her feet."

"I… see."

"Right so, I want to be able to stay with this little girl, give up my past, and just try and raise her the best I can. So, would you mind?"

"I'll offer up your apology to God."

"Thank you sir." I said, and left the booth. Now, I was completely serious about the whole life transformation thing, but I also loved making fun of church people. This whole 'modern Christianity' thing was just hilarious! I mean, that story about God fighting Satan wasn't even in the Bible. It was just a story that early Christians made up, so that they had someone to blame for babies dying, mass murder, and other tragedies. Instead of just blaming the dark nature of themselves.

Now, do I believe Satan existed? Yes, my grandfather was in Hell, being tortured by him for awhile. But did that confrontation between him and God over bowing down to Adam ever really happen? Nope.

Satan was never an angel, Satan in my opinion was just a physical manifestation of human sin.

People could chat my ear off about it however much they pleased, but modern Baptists preach about how the Bible is the one source of pure truth, yet they cling to a legend about Satan and God that isn't anywhere in the Bible.

Connor's voice broke through my thoughts. "Done?"

I turned to see him standing there, an ice cream cone in each hand. One was chocolate, the other mint chocolate chip. He held out the mint one, a small smile on his face.

I took it from him, offering him a small smile in return, "Yeah. I'm done."