"What?"

She scoots back onto the bed, making herself more comfortable. "Well, it was you who changed her mind a bit. It happened up at the shoot at the mountains. Remember? You manipulated her acting and she felt bested by you for it. So she wanted to beat you at your own game and, therefore, acting was chosen. Eventually, though, she did figure out that it was her passion, but that was after she realized that the skills that had brought her to that intersection were only things she was taught to take over the ryokan with the leech. That made her lost, but also furious. It was then she decided that she wanted to do things under her own power for things she chose herself. She found her love and passion for this job and has stood behind it since."

"She wants to beat me?"

"In a way, yes, but not in that few of words. It's more than just beating you."

"So what is it?"

"In her newfound respect, especially after you helped her find our lovely Mio, that dream got changed in a fashion." A simple smile appears on her lips while thinking of Kyoko. "She wants to be able to act beside you without you leading her through every step in a project, not to stand on top of you as you beg with tears for mercy because of the brilliance of her own acting."

What the-? "That was the dream before?"

"Hon, if only you knew."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You know that her imagination is quite powerful, right?"

"Yeah...it is," he states slowly, startled by the turn. "What of it?"

"And once she sets her mind on something, it is done with every detail perfect because it is in her blood." His mind flashes back to a memory of her crying face when she was six years old and didn't get a hundred. Her mother, again. "Proof of that would be me even talking to you right now." She lays back onto the bed and looks at the ceiling, her hands folded over her stomach.

"Well, that part may be done a little too well," he mutters. The feeling of talking to Kyoko has long since past. It truly feels like I'm talking to a different person right now. Someone different, but someone close to her.

"It has gotten her into trouble before too. Remember the ghost floor outside the recording rooms when she was done with the floor? Sitting on a fractured ankle? Going beyond for the manager job and taking care of you in all your stubbornness to the length of collapsing out of exhaustion here? That bruise on her leg from pushing herself too hard in training for another drama? And that only names a few!"

"I guess I didn't think about that portion of her until now," he says more to himself. "I'll have to remember that."

"You had better remember all of this Ren."

"I know, I know."

"So, the mini point would be the voodoo dolls. You're familiar with the half-version of you that Mara received for her birthday, right?"

"Yes." It was really creepy and even had different faces with it. Perfect in every way he could tell. No wonder she knew I was Cain. He inwardly shudders at the memory of her explaining how she found out. Eyes like a freaking hawk's on steroids, that girl. It's unreal.

"Well, she has more than that one."

Ren looks at her for the longest time with just a blank stare. Natsu turns her head at the silence permeating the room and meets his eyes. She just sits there with her golden eyes without backing down whereas her springy counterpart would have fizzled entirely in maybe eight seconds. Or less. Ren keeps his voice even when he finally speaks, saying "you mean to tell me that she has more than one of those half-sized dolls of me?"

Natsu lets out a short laugh. "Oh god, no. At most they are seven inches tall."

This relaxes him. Somewhat. "Voodoo dolls though?" Like bad witchcraft from the bayou kind of voodoo?

"Yes. She finds them therapeutic to make actually. The first couple were made to get her frustrations out on the leech." She smiles with a cruel edge to it. "The faces on his are ones that beg for mercy like some of the girls at school under my hand as they beg and plead on the ground." What? Oh wait. She's a bully. "But after you came along, that is all they are modelled on. They are all different 'you's. Depressed, smiling kindly, that fake smile that conceals demons that makes her want to run, sleeping, the Emperor, Cain, an impassive you, one that she uses to scold herself when you aren't available to do it yourself-"

"So she just has all of these 'mini-me's floating around?"

"Yes. I believe Kanae has seen them and may be able to fill you in there with the little details. The point is that there are more of you than there is of that leech."

That doesn't seem like a bragging point. "But they're voodoo dolls. From all that I've heard, voodoo isn't a good thing to be dabbling in. Where in the world did she get into this anyway?"

She rolls her eyes and sighs exasperatedly. "My god, you're missing the point!"

"How?"

"Her main focus is on you, dummy."

Dummy? "Again, how? Because every single time Fuwa's name comes up, she-"

"Is ticked, I know. You forget that I'm a part of her, stupid. The grudges even pop out automatically. Kind of like a Pavlov thing." Pavlov? "But she doesn't keep him in her bag." Pavlov was the psychology guy with the dogs, right?

The image of him in a Santa-sack being dragged around by the petite little girl flits through his mind before he bats it away. "And this is supposed to be a good thing, right?"

"Weird enough, yes. It means that even if you can't see her every day, you are still there."

"As a voodoo doll," he flatly states.

"A handcrafted, specially made, and intrinsically detailed voodoo doll."

"But a voodoo doll nonetheless!"

"Well don't think of it like that. You've known all along that she was a little bit different with the whole fairy thing, so this shouldn't be that bad. Think of it in another way if it helps. They are just mini embodiments of the different fractures of your soul or something. But I dunno. I'm not into the whole voodoo thing."

"Fractures of my soul?"

"I told you I'm not a voodoo person, but that's the best way I can spin it. Not all voodoo is bad voodoo. All I know for sure is that it helps her sometimes. She talks out loud to them and everything! It's like getting her thoughts out into the air helps her. She goes to you for advice even when you don't know it."

He sits there in silence, thinking it over. "So..it's good. Alright."