A/N: Three chapters in this week! I'm working hard haha ;) My mind kept on drifting about this story so I started the work as soon as I can. Typing is hard since the lights are out and my desk is located away from the window. This sucks!

OOC? Please don't complain.

Okay, this one is quite long compared to the other chapters. ;) Better? Don't get use to it ;)

Chapter 15. Confrontation

"Yumi, I've missed you so much…"

"I've missed you, too…"

Sachiko's breath hitched. It's been so long since she had heard Yumi's beautiful voice. She took hurried steps towards Yumi, wanting to feel her body next to hers.

"Yumi."

"Mommy."

Sachiko whipped around at the sound of a small voice. There, a couple of steps away from her stood a little girl, tears streaming her little face.

"Yana."

Sachiko stood frozen as she watched Yumi moved towards the little girl and engulfed her in a big hug.

"Don't worry, Baby, Mommy is here."

"I'm scared. Let's go home please."

"Of course."

She wanted to call Yumi back, but no words came out of her lips. She watched in absolute horror as Yumi walked away, not even sparing a glance at her.

"No!!! Yumi!!!"

The sound of birds singing woke Sachiko from her nightmare.

"Yumi, don't you love me anymore? Did you really forget about me already?"

She cried for sometime, unable to bear the thought of Yumi alive yet didn't love her anymore. When she raised her teary eyes, she saw her and Yumi's photo looking and smiling at each other during one of their dates. And then her gaze settled on the photos of the grown-up Yumi. Her expression turned from hurt to tender, before it was replaced with a firm one.

"There's no way I'm going to give up now, Yumi. I'll see you again."

Definitely, she'll see Yumi again. She wanted to see her ever since she saw the photos.

But first things first. A few things must be done.

---o---

Sachiko waited anxiously. Today would be the time that would cement the truth. Concrete evidence will be necessary before she could plan her next steps.

It's better to be armed with information.

Lots of information.

---o---

"The test showed that it's negative. The DNA of the person at the grave did not match with that of Fukuzawa Yumi-san. And, the DNA of Fukuzawa Yumi-san matched with Houribe Aya-san."

Sachiko swayed. She felt nauseated. Though she didn't have any hesitations anymore, the truth still came as a surprise.

She had been crying and mourning over the grave of someone she didn't know? She wanted to scream with anger.

There's only one person whom she knew that could have done it.

Actually, two of them.

"Thank you very much, Doctor."

Once only trusted people were left, Sachiko turned to the two persons who had helped her a lot.

"Onee-sama, Sei-sama, I'm really…"

"There's no need to thank us. We did what must be done, for you, for us, for Yumi-chan," Sei said before Sachiko could say anymore.

"Don't you know it's impolite to speak while someone's still talking?" Sachiko said sternly, before her face softened and a hint of smile touched her lips.

Sei grinned cheekily while Youko wiped a single tear that made way to her cheek. It was the closest thing to a true smile that she had seen from Sachiko for a very long time.

"What's your plan?"

"I need to talk to someone and I want the truth."

---o---

"You wanted to talk to me," Tooru said at her daughter standing in front of him. He avoided looking at his wife who was also there. She must have heard something from their daughter.

"Yes, Father," Sachiko said, trying to keep herself calm, though inside she wanted to start screaming at him.

"I think you know why I'm here, Father."

"How would I know when you hadn't told me anything yet," he said as he leaned on his chair.

"Let's not play games, Father. Tell me what happened to Yumi after the accident," she said firmly. The absence of any flicker of surprise in her father's face told her that he knew what happened, he knew everything. Anger started to boil inside her.

Tooru was silent for a moment as he pondered what happened many years ago. He gazed intently at her daughter.

"That day…"

---o---

"I want you to make sure that that thing is out of her life," the old man commanded firmly.

Tooru was silent for a moment.

"I can't let you do that, Father."

Surprise showed in his father's face as his angry gazed turned to him.

"And why are you opposing me this time, Tooru. Have you lost your mind?"

"She saved my daughter. If it wasn't for her, then Sachiko would be the one in her position right now," Tooru said. He remembered the sight of that girl, almost unrecognizable, and then he thought about his daughter being in that situation.

No.

He didn't want that to happen to her.

Right there and then, he decided that his daughter was more important than anything.

"That's the way of life. She chose that. And now I'm choosing my way. I want her completely out of my heir's life."

Tooru gauged the seriousness in his father's face.

"And if it didn't happen?"

Anger flared in the old man's eyes.

"I'll make sure that they wouldn't see each other again. I'll destroy that family. And your daughter, I'll have her locked in the mansion if I had to. Or I'll send her abroad."

No. He couldn't let that happen.

Not to her daughter.

Not to the family of the person who protected her daughter's life.

"I have a proposition for you, Father."

"What proposition? I don't need to hear anymore that you want to say. What I want you to do is to follow my orders."

He knew that he couldn't completely oppose his father. And his power wasn't as strong as his father's.

He needed to lay his cards carefully.

"You will hear me out, Father, because if you don't, I'll make sure that what you want to do will be found out."

"What are you talking about, Tooru?" The old man asked in controlled anger. He could see the vein in his forehead pulsating with the anger.

"I don't want that person to be killed. As a payment for protecting my daughter's life, I want her to live," he said evenly, and before his father burst into anger, he continued hastily, "She will live, but she won't stay in Japan. Her family will leave Japan. She will leave Japan In that way, she will be far from Sachiko. And I'll make sure that Sachiko would believe that she is dead."

The older man was silent for a moment.

"No. I want her dead!"

"No."

The old man gauged the seriousness of the younger man.

"Make sure you do a clean job."

"It will be a lot of trouble, but I can do it," he said firmly.

The old man didn't say anything more, and he took it as an agreement.

Right that day, he arranged everything.

He paid the hospital to declare that Fukuzawa Yumi died shortly after she was brought into the hospital. He paid someone to put her name on a grave of another person. When money didn't work, threats did.

Last of all, he talked to the family. He knew their daughter's condition. She suffered badly from the accident. And to top all of the damage, she's in coma. It will require a lot of money to sustain her, rehabilitate her, make her whole again if she'll ever be. She's hanging on a thin thread to life. And the family didn't have what they needed even if they sell their company.

In exchange for him paying all the expenses she will need, the family will leave Tokyo. He suggested the United States, because of the advancement in medicine there, because that's what their daughter needed. And to make sure that he had done what he needed to do to save her from whatever things that may happen to her if she stayed in Japan.

Right there and then, through the Ogasawara's private jet, he had the family traveled abroad.

---o---

"Father, how could you, how could you do that to me?" Sachiko said as the calm exterior she's wearing gave away.

For the first time that she had known of, she cried hard in front of her father. She had suffered for so many years. She had mourned for what she thought was Yumi's death, when all along her father knew that she's alive.

"How could you be so cruel, Father?"

Sayako held her crying daughter at her arms as she threw an angry look to her husband who looked to have aged many years. She couldn't believe what she just heard. When Sachiko asked her about what happened after the accident, she told her what she had heard from her husband, what her husband had told her, that Yumi-chan didn't survive the accident and her family moved away in order to forget.

She was so worried with her daughter's life then that she hadn't paid so much attention to the Fukuzawas, or Yumi-chan for that matter.

"I know you can't forgive me for what I have done, Sachiko. I'm scared then, scared that my father would disinherit me, that my family would live like common people. And yet I can't let him do everything that he wanted. In exchanged for not being able to fight for you, I tried to protect the person you cared for, even if you didn't know it, even if she didn't know it," Tooru said calmly.

"And you just stood by when our daughter was slowly killing herself?" Sayako accused her husband as she cried with her daughter.

Tooru avoided his wife's eyes.

"I wanted to. But you know the old man, Sayako. He will kill Yumi-chan's family if I tried to oppose him again. He didn't like already that I let her live."

"You and your father are not gods, Tooru."

Tooru didn't answer. Instead, he turned her attention to his daughter.

"Sachiko, I want you to be careful. Father has men watching Yumi-chan's family."

Sachiko halted from crying as she lifted her gaze to her father.

"I also had men watching Yumi-chan's family, making sure that Father's men won't do anything to harm them. But we don't know what Father will do if he finds out that you already know. Be careful with your actions, Sachiko."

Sachiko was truly mad at her father for deceiving her. At the same time, she felt relief at knowing that he's at her side.

But still, she couldn't just forgive him easily.

A/N: I just thought of something while I was revising this chapter. Do you think a detective Yoshino would be fitting for the story? Or maybe an investigative reporter? Whatever haha It's something to add again to the already long story haha ;)

I haven't thought about the title for the next one, although I'm almost done revising it ;)

And, it's 1:00 PM already, so I have to go back to work ;)

---Arvendell---

23 October 2008

1:00 PM