Akisame had dressed me in a clean kimono and taken me into the dining room where Sakaki and a group of other people were waiting. A giant of a man with dark skin and blue hair ran up to us.

"Oh, the girl is just as cute as Sakaki said. Can Apachai play with her?" he asked.

"She's still very sick, Apachai," Akisame told him. "She needs to rest."

"Okay," Apachai said. "Apachai will wait until she is better." Akisame sat down, keeping me in his lap.

"Let me introduce you," he said. "You already know our Karate Master, Shio Sakaki, and you just met Apachai Hopachai our Muai Tai champion. Then there is Kensei Ma, the Chinese Martial Arts master, our maiden of weapons Shugure Kosaka, the elder of us all Hayato Furinji, his granddaughter Miu and our beloved disciple Kenichi Shirahama."

"It's nice to meet you all," I said. "I'm sorry if I'm intruding."

"Not at all, young lady!" The elder boomed. "We are happy your fever has finally broken! You had us worried."

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Don't apologize for being sick," Sakaki said. I smiled at this.

I crossed my eyes as a spoonful of rice was held before my face. I followed the arm holding the spoon and looked up at Akisame.

"I can feed myself," I protested.

"You could barely wash yourself," he pointed out. "Now open your mouth." I did as I was told, swallowing the rice.

"But-…" I tried.

"No buts," he responded, feeding me more rice. I glared and puffed out my cheeks.

"I'm not a baby," I said.

"No," he agreed. "You're a stubborn young woman."

"Oh bite me," I said, eating more rice.

"Don't tempt me," he remarked. My eyes grew wide and I blushed, choking on my mouthful. Akisame leaned me forward, patting my back and putting a glass of water to my lips.

"I'll make you a deal," he said, when I was all right. "If you can walk, you can feed yourself."

"That's it?" I asked, surprised.

"That's it," he confirmed. He stood, lifting me up and setting me on my feet a few paces from the table. I eyed him suspiciously, but shrugged and took a careful step. My legs remained stable, so I took another then another.

"See! I can-whoa!" My legs folded beneath me. Akisame caught me before I hit the floor and gave me a smug smile.

"Fiiiiiiiiiiiiine," I sighed. "You win!" He lifted me up and resumed our former place at the table.

"You're too weak right now," he informed me.

"How sick was I?" I asked.

"If your fever hadn't broken when it did, I was going to take you to the hospital," he said. My eyes widened at this. He smiled reassuringly and fed me some more rice. I snuggled into his chest, letting him feed me.

"Where's your family?" Miu asked.

"Back in America where I left them," I said.

"Shouldn't you call them?" Sakaki asked. "They have to be worried that they haven't heard from you."

"They haven't heard from me in years," I said, flippantly. "I doubt they'd notice, or even care."

There was an awkward silence.

"I don't suppose I should ask exactly why you haven't kept in touch," Akisame commented.

"My father is an abusive, alcoholic control freak and my mother is a narcissistic, self-centered enabler," I deadpanned.

"I'm sorry," Sakaki said.

"It's not your fault," I said, flippantly.

"You seem very nonchalant about it," Kensei remarked.

"Fretting over it won't change what is," I replied. "My parents are assholes and all the tears and anger in the world won't change that. I've cried my tears for what I never had, there's no use belaboring it."

I finished the bowel of rice and sighed in content. My stomach was full and my eyes were getting heavy. I made a noise in the back of my throat and cuddled against Akisame.

He chuckled and reached down, petting my hair.

"Tired?" he asked. I nodded my head, yawning.

"So why did you come to Japan?" Sakaki asked.

"Start over," I said. "America just didn't have anything for me really, so I picked up and left. I figured no better place to do that than here where I already had a job lined up."

"Shouldn't you call in and let your job know you're sick?" Akisame asked.

"No," I said. "I'm on vacation this whole month. My first day was the day you found me. Lame way to start a vacation. I was going to go to the beach. Oh well."

"Oh yeah, what was with the gang members?" Sakaki asked. At this, everyone at the table turned to me. I sighed and closed my eyes.

"I had gone to a bar after work just to relax," I began. "It's a bar I go to a lot, even though it's male oriented, but they have better music, better drinks and I get hassled less then when I go to the female oriented bars because creeps stake those places out to pick up tail.

I went in, got my drink and began playing some pool with the regulars, as I always do, nothing too exciting.

I had fun, but my bar friends had to leave, so I sat at the bar with my book, drinking my beer.

Suddenly, this group of guys came up to me and start hitting on me. Real trashy stuff, too. Asking me if I was free that night, asking me if they could get me a drink, asking if I would come back to their place.

I told them no, but they didn't like that. They started bragging that there were in a gang and with all the men there, they could certainly keep me 'satisfied'."

Sakaki growled, Akisame tightened his grip on me, Shugure narrowed her eyes and Kensei made a small noise of disgust.

"The bar tender overheard them and saw my look of disgust and told them to scram. They got pissed and started making threats, which got the bouncer in there, and he threw them out. The bouncer roughed them up a bit before they left, he hates guys that don't take 'no' for an answer.

It got late, so I decided to leave. I should have called a cab or gotten a bus, but it was a nice night and I wanted to walk home.

I got a few blocks from the bar when the same group of guys found me. They were pissed and threatening me. I told them to go home, but that only made them angrier. They told me they were going to make me their 'gang bitch' and they tried to grab me."

"What did you do?" Miu asked.

"I used the last of my mace on two of them, slashed ones face up with my keys and ran like hell," I said. "I hoped they would give up when they saw I wasn't going to go down easy, most guys do, but they chased me."

"Then Akisame found you?" Kenichi asked.

"No," I said. "They caught me at one point and all started trying to grab me. I jammed my finger in one guy's eye, bit another one, kicked one as hard as I fucking could in the groin and broke one guys nose. After I started running again, that's when Akisame found me."

"You don't go down easy, do ya?" Sakaki asked with a grin.

"Nope," I said. "I aimed to do as much damage as possible. I'm not going to lie back and let myself get raped. Plus, when they caught me the second time, they were even more ticked off. They were deciding what to do with my dead body and I refuse to die in the streets at the hands of some punks.

I didn't care about fighting fair, either. Eight gang members against one woman? Fair wasn't an option."

"I only fought four," Akisame said, perplexed.

"I guess the two I maced, the one I kicked in the nuts and the one whose nose I broke didn't follow," I said.

"Well, I commend you, young lady," Hayato said. "Not many would have the wherewithal to do what you did. Using your keys as a weapon was brilliant, too." I blushed.

"Uhm, thanks," I said.

"Well, I doubt those men will bother you again," Kensei said.

"I hope," I sighed. I yawned and Akisame smiled.

"Bedtime," he said, standing up with me in his arms. I nodded and waved at everyone.

"Goodnight," I said.

"Goodnight," they all replied.