A/N: So this chapter basically answers the question a lot of you guys have been asking about why no one was stepping forth to show that they actually cared. I hope I managed to convey their feelings appropriately.

Chapter 6:

Regret?

He should have known something like this would have happened eventually. The kid had been acting differently ever since that day he had stayed out all night. The fact that the princess and the mage treated him with such thinly veiled contempt did not help things any. Figuring the kid needed some space and time to himself, though, Kurogane had chosen to keep his distance and not pry. But maybe… Maybe if he had stepped in at the first signs of change, it would not have come down to this.

The kid was missing. Had been missing, for the past six days.

Even as he searched the darkened streets, he could not help but curse himself. He should have done something earlier. So what if the kid refused to meet his eye or listen to him talk or preferred not to stay in his company? He should have just punched him on the head and gotten him to listen. Broken down the door to his room when he started locking himself up in there whenever he was at the apartment. Gotten him some help, when his skin started turning pale and his eyes started developing bruises under them. But he had been a fool to think that the boy needed time alone to deal with the changes. That he needed some space to adjust to travelling with their group.

He should not have done that.

He should never have done that.

If he had just torn down that wall… the kid would still be with them. Hurt and angry and depressed, perhaps. But at least he would be still with them.

Oh, who was he kidding? He had tried to do all that. But every time he looked at this kid, he was reminded of his student. The one he had taught how to swordfight, the one he had started this journey with.

The truth was, he was not his student, though. He was not the one he had taught how to swordfight. Wasn't the one he had started the journey to find out the true meaning of strength with. The fact that the one he had started looking at as his charge had hurt them all so badly might have been the reason why he had kept his distance from this new kid. The one he had let get close to him had betrayed him and hurt him so badly that every time he looked at this boy, he could not help but feel anger. The way this boy had looked at them all in the beginning, with such sad longing in his eyes, all he had tried to tell them had been just that. He was not the boy they had travelled with, but he was also not the reason that other boy had left.

Somehow… none of them had been willing to see that.

The princess had been in love with the other boy. This copy, with the same face and the same eyes and the same longing smile on his face, served as nothing but a bitter reminder of what they had lost in that world with the burning rain. And despite all his efforts to make them see otherwise, none of them had been able to set aside their anger and let this newcomer into their little group. Sure, he travelled with them, sure he fought for them and brought back the princess's feather just like the other, but he was not the boy that had left them. And so, where there had been care and love in her eyes for the other one, for this one, she could only stare at him coldly and at times indifferently.

The mage had done his best to be supportive of the other boy whenever the price became too much for the kid to bear, but for this one… polite aloofness at best, outright curt responses at worst.

And him?

He had done nothing to truly acknowledge the kid. He knew that the kid was hurting yet he just stood by and watched as the boy spiraled down towards his own destruction.

The sun had lowered beyond the skyline, the long shadows dancing across the walls of the back alleys like eerie spiders. It was a good thing they did not have a Chess match that day, otherwise they'd have had to cut their search short. The princess, because of her bad leg, had stayed behind at the apartment along with the dimension-hopping meat bun. Only he and the magician were walking around these streets, searching for the missing brunette.

He caught sight of a familiar mop of messy brown hair out of the corner of his eye.

"Kid!"