Chapter twelve:

During lunch Hikaru finds a secluded place on the school grounds and he tries calling Kaoru's cellphone. He waits with his cellphone against his ear waiting to see if his brother will pick up. He almost sighs in relief when he hears Kaoru's voice come on the other side of the line greeting him. "Hey brother. How are things going?"

"It has been busy." Kaoru admits to Hikaru who is a little worried that he is being overworked. "But despite this we've all been doing our best to not overwork ourselves. So I am doing okay. Just on a small break right now. We've started to make steps towards figuring this out. How are you doing?"

"A little better now that I get to talk to you." Hikaru admits and his twin senses just make him know that Kaoru is smiling at hearing this.

"Aw thanks Hikaru." Kaoru responds getting a slight chuckle from the older twin.

"Say. Is Haruhi at the facility?" Hikaru asks immediately feeling the whole mood shift at this.

"Yeah she is. She's in the early stages of the illness. But her arrival did help us find something that might be able to lead us towards a solution. Speaking of which I had a thought before you called. Could you humor me for a moment?"

"Of course. Go ahead." Hikaru agrees always ready to help his brother think through something. He's done this before and never tells anyone about anything said since they don't need to know, this is between him and his brother after all.

"So if the flowers we found could be either part of the way that the patients are infected or they are a part of a way to heal them. But what if we're missing another plant that we don't even know that can be used? Plus unless we find more of these flowers we only have so many to try to help us try to figure out what to do with them." Kaoru goes off with Hikaru being quiet letting Kaoru try to work through his thoughts at first, only planning to stop it if he knows that his brother needs it. "Not to mention that the people under our care only have so long before the illness claims them. So even if we figure out the solution it might be only able to help those not too far along until we find a way to make it stronger." His footsteps can faintly be heard as he paces where he is while he goes on letting his thoughts just run through his head. "Then again if the flower is used to help heal this illness then we'd have to see what it can do for a patient. At least before we could even begin to try mixtures to go along with it." He suddenly stops and not even his footsteps can be heard anymore. "Hold on." He doesn't elaborate any further and just lets out a gasp which has Hikaru worried feeling like something isn't right. He speaks again when Hikaru speaks the younger twin's name. "Sorry Hikaru. I think I have made a discovery. I was focusing on the wrong thing before. I think that it might be helpful. Thank you for listening."

"Anytime." Hikaru isn't sure what discovery his brother has made though he is at least glad to have been able to help with it.

"Hikaru?"

"Yeah?"

"Be careful out there. Try to not get yourself secluded in a park or something like that. I don't want you getting this illness."

Hikaru lets out an almost silent breath at this knowing that seeing Haruhi sick must have made Kaoru worry over Hikaru himself. He knows his brother will worry about him if he sees someone that they even remotely care for sick or hurt. He is fine with it understanding that it is because Kaoru cares and he doesn't want the same thing to happen to his twin. "I promise I will be extra careful out here. I will do everything that I possibly can to not catch this illness. You be careful out there too okay?"

"I promise I will keep taking all the needed steps to not get myself sick." Kaoru assures Hikaru sounding relieved to hear Hikaru's assurance. "I'll talk to you again soon."

"Talk to you again soon." Hikaru agrees and the call ends so he heads back into the school.

In the facility…

Kaoru looks around the safe areas for Jiro which he doesn't find his mentor. He gets suited up then looks around for him before finally finding him just exiting where the flowers are being kept. "Jiro!" He calls and the other comes over to him. "Can we talk?" He requests to the man mentoring him who nods his head.

"Let us just get out of these and find somewhere private." Jiro leads the way so they can do just that. He soon enough has Kaoru sitting just outside of the building. "What's on your mind?"

"Well during my break I was thinking about the discovery of the flower. Mainly starting on if the flower is the cure and if we'd be missing another plant we don't know about. However I do understand that the part there shouldn't be my point of focus. I am still in training after all, and that you said that I will be allowed some time to learn about trying to find a cure when you have time. I just needed to get it out. After I let those thoughts past I realized something. Someone that is doing this on purpose has to have knowledge about the plants. This is a very elaborate illness and symptoms. Whoever came up with it would have had to likely have knowledge about the illnesses and potions. What if they're one of us?"

"Honestly. I have been having similar thoughts. It could be one of us or it could even just be someone who learned all of these things in order to create the illness. Even then they would have had to study a lot that is for sure." Jiro places an assuring hand on Kaoru's shoulder. "We need to trust our peers and make sure that we do our best for the patients. Despite this we also need to remember that someone can always hurt another, even those that are like us can end up hurting someone. We all have a darkness in us with some having it more than others. So Kaoru I expect you to keep this to yourself for right now. Until we get any sort of proof that one of our peers is working against us then we won't cause a panic. Even if we do get proof then we'll still keep it quiet. It works better to do so in order to catch someone. They've proven they are smart after all. Not to mention that we don't want things to become tense or anything by saying one of us is doing this without knowing who. It'll just cause a lot of distrust to spread and our patients can suffer because of it. That is why I will also let you in on things but ask you to keep quiet. Matters need to be dealt with correctly and properly after all. Others don't need to know every last detail until it is something that we do share."

"I won't tell a soul." Kaoru swears to his mentor at hearing this earning an appreciative nod.

"Don't tell anyone, just come straight to me, if you have a patient or overhear someone else mention that they have a patient that suddenly gets worse too fast. Even if it is a new symptom that is unknown. Anything of that nature. It could be signs that indeed someone in our midst could be responsible in some way. Just try to not react and worry others when it happens. The less attention drawn to an event the better."

"I will." Kaoru agrees and gets a pat on his shoulder before the two of them head, he is walking behind his mentor, to go get back to work. He really hopes that the one responsible for this is just someone smart who just got lucky with making a new illness to use like a weapon on the public.