"Why don't we help you find your Momma and Papa?" Xellos offered, some time after the chaos had died down. "If you tell us what happened, maybe we can help. Okay?"

"Okay." Koi nodded with a very adult-like expression. " We all went out on the lake. It was my brithday. Then a storm came up, and the boat tipped. And... And... And then Firia-sama found me." To emphasize his relief, Koi hugged the blonde feircely. The shocked dragon rubbed the boy's back soothingly.

"We'll find your parents." She whispered. "I promise we will."

"Where do you live?" Xellos asked calmly, his violet slit eyes glittering. "Maybe your parents managed to find a way home."

"On the east shore." Koi replied. "Near where the river feeds the lake."

"C'mon." The Mazoku smiled, holding out a gloved hand. "Let's get going. Who knows? I'll bet your Momma and Papa are there right now, wondering where you are."

"If I were your mother, I'd be worrying about you remembering to was properly before meals," Firia muttered. "And not about the company you'd be keeping." Several comments about 'stupid namagomi Mazoku were uttered and ignored gracefully.

Xellos shot her a glare as he helped Koi balance in the piggy-back position, then tapped his foot impatiently as the dragon priestess shouldered her pack.

"Coming, Firia?" He prodded verbally, closed eyes still mocking her.

"Hai, hai." She grumbled.

"Firia-sama? Xellos-sama?"

"Yes?" Both adults answered simultaneously. Firia gave the Mazoku one of the Looks of Death, disrupted by Koi's continuation.

"Thank you for finding me and being so nice to me." The aqua hared youth wrapped his slender arms around Xellos' neck as he yawned.

"You're welcoming, dearling." Firia smiled gently.

For a long while, they walked in silence, the only sound their footsteps on the thickly vegitated forest floor. Finally...

"I can see home! See? See? Firia-chan, Xellos-chan, look!" Koi pointed at a brick building that was adorned with a thatched roof and small garden. Xellos knelt to let the child down, who jumped off his back with a small cry of delight. He wiped a drop of sweat from his brow as he stretched like a cat in the sun, several joints popping.

"What's the matter, namagomi?" She poked. "Feeling your age?"

"Very funny." He clapped sarcastically.

"I try."

"Hmph."

"They're not here!" Koi's wail brought them out of their belligerant moods and towards a more worried state. Xellos disappeared in a rapid teleport, and Firia ran as fast as she could. The Mazoku and dragon still reached him at the same time, both instantly reaching out to comfort the youth.

Firia blushed seventeen shades of pink when she realized how near they all were to each other. On the child's left, Xellos embraced Koi much as a protective guardian. To his right, the blonde was doing pretty much the same thing. They were so close, she could just about feel the Mazoku's warm breath. And what was worse, she realized she was enjoying it.

Xellos' slit-pupil eyes revealed genuine sincerity as he whispered comforting things to their charge, not quite sure of how to handle the unexpected warmth of emotional energy that poured out from Koi. Sorrow, from Koi, for the missing parents. It was an unwelcome sorrow to the Mazoku. Love, from Koi again, for both said parents and the two surrogate parents that were now holding him. This attraction was more addictive than any high he had felt from the power of negative emotions. And then there was a kind of gentle, wondering care. From Firia?! Most of this emotion was focused on Koi, understandably, but there was a small tendril that reached out to him... and he wanted very much to make that tiny glimmer of care to grow into a blaze.

Koi sneezed, and both of them moved to lift him up.

"Let me." Xellos insisted, still not smiling with a Trickster's malice. "You try and hunt something for us to eat, ne, lizard lips?" He winked, cradling the child to his chest as he turned and gave her a V-sign.

She fumed as she stormed outside, transformed, and took to the air. Her wings let her anger subside.