Aimi emerged from the underground train station into the bright sun of a beautiful Monday morning. Looking around though all she could feel was anger and revulsion. The prosperity and peace the city of Karatsu enjoyed was partly the fault of her Father. He spent so much time on everyone else. But never on her. A small smile finally graced her face, “But very soon now I’ll show them!” She could already feel the odd tingling sensation under skin. With this, her third transformation, she would permanently become the powerful being she had always wanted to be. Her demonic form would be irresistible, undeniable. Not even her father would be able to look past her or pretend she didn’t matter. In front of her was the office building where “That Woman” worked. The bitch who had replaced her mother. Aimi stepped down into a small alcove feeling the queasiness coming up. She looked down at her hand, already the skin was taking on a bluish hue and the nails were lengthening and hardening. She glanced around quickly to confirm no one was watching and stepped further back into the shadows. The very first thing she would destroy was going to be that office building. As the dizziness became stronger and stronger she fumbled inside her purse for the growth formula, finally pawing it out she popped off its cap and chugged down the whole contents. In seconds, the nausea and other side effects were gone, replaced by the blinding pain of the double transformation. A greenish eldritch glow engulfed her body, and she contorted in agony and finally let out of throat-ripping scream. Then her clothes shredded as her body literally grew out of them, her ears lengthened and grew pointed, wings and a tail tore through the skin on her back, her toes fell off, replaced by cloven hooves, her canines lengthened into fangs, insectlike armor began to form over various parts of her body, her lustrous, black hair turned pure white, and then she began to grow in size, a little at first, and then faster and faster.
In just a few moments she grew large enough to damage the buildings she was hiding between, at 10 meters tall she stumbled sending a powerful clawed hand through a brick wall and people noticed her for the first time. As she corrected herself, she continued to grow, her bulk driving aside the lightly constructed shops on either side of her, eventually toppling both. People who had watched in awe not understanding what was happening panicked and began to stampede away from the giant. By now Aimi was about 17 meters tall. Stepping out onto the street she casually crushed some running civilians under her hooves and whipped her tail around slashing and tossing people into walls. She stretched her wings and beat them as hard as she could, generating winds strong enough to send grown men and women flying.
Already dozens were injured or dead. But Aimi was just getting started.
She used the new demonic power of her body to create a sword and shield, swinging both around to crush and cleave as she approached the office building. That Woman worked on the fourth floor, the west side. Aimi walked around the building until she arrived on the west side and looked into through the fourth-floor windows. “THERE YOU ARE” she cursed. Aimi drew back her blood red sword and swung it with all her might, it cleaved through the walls, windows, desks, and furnishings – and also the body of her stepmother – coming out the other side of the building. Aimi had damaged one of the main support beams and the building began to sag in on itself. To hasten its collapse Aimi rammed the building with her shield, pulverizing dozens of cubic meters of the building. It came down so fast no one got out.
Her bloodlust now driving her, Aimi turned to the next building, she knew she would have only a limited time before some kind of response occurred. She had to maximize the havoc she created before then. As she continued to grow ever larger, she waded through downtown Karatsu crushing most people, eating others, and demolishing structures at random, taking a perverse, lusty pride in the horrors she was inflicting on the city’s people, “HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!! NO ONE CAN SAVE YOU!!! I AM UNSTOPPABLE!!!” As she continued towards her goal, she began to notice feeling odd. She toppled another building stepping through it onto the street beyond. She was aroused. Very much so. But she couldn’t tell why. So, she looked around trying to puzzle out the why of this odd situation. She was getting more and more aroused all the time, something was definitely wrong. Then her eyes fell on a particular building, and she knew what had happened. Her eyes focused on a love hotel, an infamous one, the one she assumed her father had met That Woman at. “I’m a succubus??? I thought I was going to be like a lich!!! THEY TRICKED ME!!!” Consumed with fury, Aimi lashed out at the hotel crumbling it like a toy and killing nearly everyone inside.
Back at Big Fire headquarters Emperor Guillotine, Spider, Momotaro, and Doctor Overkill were watching live feeds from a small drone observation vehicle. “HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!” Guillotine laughed. “Aimi has fallen completely into our trap!”
Momotaro looked more pensive, “Yeah, but was it really necessary? The drug would have made her dependent on us anyway. Why the deception, why not just make her into the lich she wanted to be?”
Casting his sight at his minions Guillotine nodded at Doctor Overkill to explain, “A lich is an extremely powerful being. Excessively so in fact. Such power would be a clear and present threat to our existence, we could never really be sure of Aimi’s continued loyalty. She would almost certainly one day challenge Emperor Guillotine in open rebellion. The form of the succubus however, while still VERY powerful, is much more readily controlled and dealt with,” Overkill explained.
“Also, succubi are much more predictable,” offered Spider. “Thus, they can more easily be led, exploited, and eliminated. In addition, by using the same drug Konga was addicted to, we can predict the timeline of Aimi’s addiction as well and plan for her eventual dependence upon us as her sole source of it. This will delay her eventual betrayal of us considerably.”
“Let us also not forget that Aimi believes her transformation to be permanent at this stage. When she reverts to her human form 4 hours from now, she will be grateful, assuming she has escaped our trap. But sooner or later she will once again desire the power of her demonic body. We will provide the drug. The cycle will repeat. She will be ours irrevocably.”
Momotaro considered this for a few moments, “Hmmn, you are right of course. My apologies Emperor Guillotine.” And the group turned back to watching their exasperated dupe go about her rampage.
Finally, Doctor Overkill spoke, “And once her usefulness to us has ended, so will her life.”
Earlier That Morning….
Koko was roused from her pleasant sleep by an immense weight that crashed down onto her belly, instantly forcing all the air out of her lungs. Awaking with a desperate gasp for air she was confronted by the mischievous laughter of a small male child. Billy Wallace had plopped himself down on her like she was a trampoline. “BILLY WALLACE! Come here and take your punishment!” she giggled as she latched onto him with a mighty grip and gave him an especially wet kiss on his cheek, his Only Weakness.
“EWWWW!!! GROSS,” he cried as he squirmed trying to free himself from Koko’s vice like grip. Billy was strong for a six-year-old, but he had no hope against his superior enemy.
“Surrender Evil Doer!” Koko teased, “Or I shall unleash even worse horrors upon you!”
The little miscreant began to snicker and laugh and Round 2 seemed imminent until his mother arrived on the scene.
“Good morning, Koko Dear, Billy, leave Ms. Koko alone now so she can get dressed.”
The boy’s grin dropped to a lower intensity, “Yes Mama,” and he dutifully climbed down from the guest bed and left the room.
Koko closed the door with a smile so she could change. “I’ll miss this,” she thought to herself, “Going home after a week of this is gonna suck,” and as she did, as happened every single time she stayed over at the Wallace’s home, Koko began to cry quietly while she dressed for the day.
Down at the dining room table breakfast was ready and waiting, Mrs. Wallace made an excellent miso soup, Koko took any opportunity she could to have some. As the gathered family and their guest ate Koko sat and listened to their conversation with rapt attention, savoring every moment.
The ride to Unicorn headquarters was always much more pleasant with Mr. Wallace than it was with Mamoru, even if they didn’t say anything, there was a sense of comfortable companionship, their shared Nerddom that was always missing with Mamoru. Plus, Koko couldn’t help shake the idea that something just wasn’t quite right with her bodyguard, especially after Mrs. Wallace’s comments. “So, I guess giant feathered wings just wouldn’t work for Stargazer huh,” Koko lamented.
“No lass, the wings would be too heavy to be practical.” Koko fished some chewing gum from her purse, offering a piece to Wallace as well.
“Too bad,” she said as she chewed.
“Also, your design well it does come dangerously close to violating CLAMP’s copyrights you know.”
“Yeah, but she’s just SO CUTE,” Koko squeed as she thought about the heroine’s design.
“NOW A ‘WAND’ OR MORE ACCURATELY A CLUB, that we could do easily, in any shape you can imagine,” Wallace offered.
“I always liked her second wand better, after the mid-series upgrade,” Koko was completely NERDing now, having sunk into the foul waters of love for Lolis and Magical Girls thanks to Tomo’s extensive collection of anime and manga. Tomo’s parents had eventually decided her collection was too large and had encouraged her to get a part time job to pay for it in hopes that this would break her of her habit, upon which Tomo had gone out and gotten a really good job at a maid café, and with access to the funds from that the collection had grown exponentially and the adult Wallace’s soon found themselves hoist by their own petard. During her weeklong stay the collection had been shared with Koko to help keep her entertained.
After she had gushed on for at least 10 minutes, Mr. Wallace decided to steer the conversation back to Stargazer, “Anyway, how DO YOU LIKE the new targeting system for the hand rockets?”
“It’s way better than the original that’s for sure, only about ten percent of the rockets are missing completely rather than about two-thirds.” The pair continued talking shop about little upgrades and improvements for the robot all the rest of the way to the base.
Arriving at the base the pair were disturbed when the Red Alert alarm began blaring. “I’ll check the hangar and Stargazer, you head up to operations and find out what’s going on Koko,” Mr. Wallace instructed.
Koko turned and jogged towards the command center arriving minutes later.
“Ah Koko, you’re here,” there no hint of chastisement in the Commander’s voice, just a statement of fact. “About five minutes ago a giant female monster appeared in Karatsu City near the port. She’s been slowly working her way towards the docks destroying every building in her path.”
Koko looked at the recon images provided by the UAV flying over the combat zone, at least a couple dozen buildings had been reduced to rubble already, “Do we have any idea what it wants?”
The Commander crossed his arms over his barrel chest, “She seems to want to punish her father.”
Koko spun towards him in a flash, “OH COME ON! How could you POSSIBLY know that?”
“Because she can speak. She been ranting about it ever since she first appeared. We got the audio feed from a news reporter out doing a local economy piece,” the Commander elaborated. “This monster used to be human, she’s pissed, and she wants her Daddy to pay for something he did.”
Koko turned back to the big monitor. As she watched the monstrous woman destroy yet another building, she saw several hapless civilians fall through windows on the upper floors to their certain deaths Koko began to shake, it was subtle at first. But after about a minute or two without any other reaction the other Unicorn personnel in the room could not have missed her body language if they had been deliberately trying to. Finally, Koko snapped out of her temporary palsy. Her manner went completely cold, all the emotion dropped from her facial expression and her body went utterly rigid. Mamoru who was standing a couple meters from her SWORE the temperature in the room dropped 5 degrees in an instant. Koko’s voice filled the space with a whisper of pure unadulterated fury, “I can’t let this continue, she’s signed her own death warrant.” Koko turned toward the door to the hangar and stalked towards her partner. It was nearly three minutes before anyone thought to order Mamoru to try and catch up with her.
In Karatsu City Aimi had finally reached her father’s warehouses. “AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!! I’LL SHOW YOU HOW IT FEELS!!!!!” She waded into the complex of structures with abandon, her blood red sword and shield swinging wildly this way and that, crumpling structures and crushing bodies all around. Her glowing eyes grew to a white-hot brilliance and eldritch beams of power lanced out into other buildings, lighting them on fire and causing yet more destruction. Her tail lashed out at a group of men fleeing for their lives, sending them flying through the air to die when they hit the ground. Her hooves crushed vehicles, both moving and not, causing occasional explosions and yet more havoc. “I BET YOU ARE SORRY NOW DADDY!!!!!” Her wild orgy of destruction continued unabated as she approached the office building, she knew he would be found in.
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As she and Stargazer flew towards the combat zone Koko was consumed with memories. Flashbacks really, of her last fight with her gang from high school. She still had the leather jacket, though she hadn’t been able to make herself pick it up, let alone wear it, since that night. She remembered using it to wreck the boy gang she and her friends were fighting. The metal studs from the jacket absolutely devastated several noses, faces, and bare chests. Afterwards she returned home, her gang victorious as ever, to a strangely quiet, empty house. She fell asleep early, woke up at 3 AM and realized no one else was home. She began to get A Very Bad Feeling.
Aimi used her eye beams to set the last warehouse on fire and turned at last to her father’s office. She put a sexy sway in her hips and let her tail swish through the air in an enticing manner as she thrust out her generous chest, displaying herself more for her own gratification than anything else, clearly her succubus form was affecting her personality. With a superior grin she taunted her father, “Now Daddy, you’ll never forget me again,” her voice boomed. She raised her sword and swung it into the building at about chest-high to herself. She then used the momentum of the first attack to bring the weapon back around again, slashing through the office from the opposite side. Then she slammed into it with her shield. The tortured architecture couldn’t withstand the power being used against it and it began to collapse. A gas main split open and the inevitable spark lit off an enormous explosion setting the crumbling structure alight. “HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT DADDY,” she bellowed. The fact that the destruction of his office building with him inside had resulted in her father’s death had not even registered to Aimi.
As Koko sat in the crash couch, entranced in the memories of her past, a chime sounded announcing their arrival over the ruined dock yard. Koko didn’t hear it at first, she was too caught up in the memory of the nice policeman who knocked on her door at 4:30 in the morning to tell her that her parents and siblings were dead. Tears came to her eyes. Stargazer continued to circle over the succubus high in the sky. It BWEEP’d for Koko’s attention, but for several seconds she simply could not be reached.
Aimi heard the robot’s arrival as its jet engines roared in protest over being forced to circle uselessly. Turning to the sound she fired her eye beams at the robot, but it passed in front of the Sun, and she lost it in the glare. Several seconds later it came out into clear sky again and Aimi blasted at it again.
Still silently crying Koko was finally roused from her distraction. Seeing the succubus turn to engage Stargazer, Koko held the control device to her mouth, “Stargazer, kill her.” The robot BWEEP’d in response and dived towards the ground. Twin blasts of energy from Aimi’s eyes burned through the sky where the robot would have been had it not dived so sharply.
Aimi realized almost too late the robot’s intention, dropping her sword she used both arms to brace her shield against the impact as the Stargazer crashed into her at nearly 400 kilometers per hour. The impact shattered the shield and Aimi and the robot went flying backward through the devastated dock yard, further ruining the area. Eventually the two were separated with Aimi rolling one way and Stargazer tumbling in another direction. In the crash couch Koko’s arms and legs flew around, dragged by gravity and momentum in every direction beyond Koko’s ability to control them, she felt a dull, crunching sensation from her leg, her body went cold, and she instantly began sweating from every pore, but put it out of her mind. Stargazer whirled through a badly damaged warehouse, collapsing it like a cardboard box and scattering billions of yen worth of goods in all directions. For her part, Aimi ended up rolling through the burning remnants of her Father’s office building, coming to a stop and getting to her hooves much faster than Stargazer. As she stepped out of the ruins of the structure some of her feathers were singed, and parts of her hair were blackened with ash, but otherwise she appeared undamaged. Steadying herself she raised her left arm and manifested a new weapon, a heavy arcane chain and flail grew out of the chitinous armor of her arm, and when it hit the ground, it pulverized the concrete. In her right hand the sword materialized again. A predatory grin spread over her terrible, beautiful face, “I’ve been waiting for this,” she told the robot. Winding her right arm back she whipped the chain flail at Stargazer, the heavy spiked ball struck the robot’s head with enough force that Stargazer was knocked off its feet, it crashed to the ground tearing up yet more property and raising a huge cloud of dust and debris.
“COUGH! COUGH!” In the crash couch Koko was stunned by the twin impacts of the flail and the ground and the sheer agony filling her existence from her leg, she never would have believed so much dust had accumulated in the little maintenance hatch and had now been set free to fill the space. “Stargazer, we’ve got to get up.” The robot BWEEP’d in reply and slowly righted itself. Blinding pain was coursing through her body from her leg, she KNEW something was definitely wrong.
“Get a good look at the robot’s head,” the commander ordered the pilot of the remote support vehicle. The UAV’s camera zoomed in and saw the crumpled armor of the face, one of the robot’s eyes was completely gone, it looked like a quarter of the head was entirely crushed flat.
“Sensors indicate the right eye is completely destroyed Sir,” one of the techs reported.
On the screen Stargazer righted itself and turned to face the giant demonic girl.
“She’s STILL going to fight?”
“Computer says the robot’s targeting system is damaged.”
“More faults coming up now Sir, the robot’s combat efficiency is down by 70%.”
The Commander hit the transmit button, “KOKO GET OUT OF THERE! Retreat now! Stargazer is heavily damaged! Koko Sokko do you read us?!?!?!”
There was no response.
The Commander turned to one of the techs, “Do we still have comms?”
The tech checked the systems before replying, “No Sir, that hit took out pretty much everything.”
Aimi was extremely pleased with herself. She had obviously badly damaged the robot. Intending to follow up, she started winding the flail again, “You want some more? How did my flail taste?”
Hearing the taunt over the external audio pick up feed Koko replied, “It tastes terrible.” Checking the control device she told her partner, “We can’t mess around with this girl. HAND ROCKETS!” Instead of a pleasing BWEEP, there was instead a decidedly unpleasant BWONG. The targeting system was offline rendering the rockets useless. “Bypass the targeting system! Just point the hands at her!” Again BWONG! “God Dammit! I suppose the Plasma Blaster is down too then,” she asked the control device. A confirmative, but apologetic “BWEEP” was her reply. Koko slammed her fist down on the arm of the crash couch. Her vision was blurring out, she was having trouble concentrating, and she was losing consciousness, “Stargazer! We have to finish her fast! I’m gonna pass out!”
As Aimi was preparing to hurl the flail again Stargazer suddenly flew forward towards her, the flail flashed out but hit only the empty air where the robot had been a split second before. 35,000 tons of robotic fury plowed into her at full speed and the two titans went tumbling once again through the rubble that had once been a dock.
Koko saw through the remaining exterior cameras that Aimi was stunned. “GOT HER NOW!!! STARGAZER THE ARM!! BREAK THE ARM WITH THE FLAIL!!”
Stargazer’s enormous gauntlets grasped Aimi’s arm above and below the elbow, then the robot’s right arm, which held Aimi’s forearm, wrenched down. There was horrific crunching sound and Aimi came instantly to full awareness as she screamed in pain! In her fury Aimi fired her eye beams again hitting Stargazer in the face and further ruining the head and its armor.
Somehow one remaining exterior camera was still working, allowing Koko and the robot to still see their opponent, “Don’t stop now! WE HAVE TO FINISH HER RIGHT NOW!!” Koko exclaimed as sweat plopped down into her eyes from the bangs matted to her forehead.
A happy BWEEP reply came from the robot and while one hand held Aimi down the other cocked back and flew forward pounding the succubus’s face. Momentarily stunned again, Aimi ceased making any moves and then Stargazer’s fist rose again and delivered another powerful blow.
In the control room the initial discomfort had faded, “Looks like Koko’s turned it around, I think she’s got this one,” Mamoru cheered.
However, after 50 seconds of a continuous rain of blows on Aimi’s face those in the control room began to feel uncertain. The giant succubus was not simply taking the beating, she was kicking and punching with her remaining useful arm, her eye beams flashed out occasionally to burrow deep troughs in Stargazer’s chest armor and even had tried to use her tail to pull the robot off her, but all to no avail. She was screaming now, in real terror. Meanwhile Stargazer’s armored fist continued to rise and fall like a pile driver, it crushed a section of roadway when it missed Aimi’s head.
“Has communications been restored yet?” the Commander asked.
“No Sir, it’s a hardware issue on Stargazer’s end. All receivers are reading offline,” a comm tech replied.
“GET OFF ME!!!” Aimi begged/demanded of her robotic foe. She was absolutely terrified! There was a VERY REAL possibility that this thing might kill her right here if she didn’t get away!!! Consequently, she continued to lash out with all the strength she could still muster trying to throw the robot off her. The longer it went on, the more panicked and desperate Aimi became, her armor was keeping her alive for now, but the pain in her face told her the thick plates were nearing their limits. Something cold filled her heart as The Fist rose again. This time there was a certain sense of “Finality” associated with it. Aimi braced herself for the impact.
This time Stargazer’s fist crashed down hard enough to break the weakened armor protecting Aimi’s face. The angled plate that protected the side of her face snapped off like rotten wood and when Stargazer’s fist descended again nothing stood in its way. The following blow snapped Aimi’s jaw provoking a wail of pain and a renewed desperate attempt to escape including a final powerful blast of her eye beams which burrowed a deep gash in Stargazer’s chest but failed to fully penetrate the armor. For Aimi, there was now simply no escape. Stargazer now sat straddling Aimi’s belly; both of its Mighty Fists pounded the helpless former human. Finally, Aimi’s arms went slack from a combination of pain and stupor, her once beautiful face a mass of bloody pulp. Stargazer seized the large armor plate covering Aimi’s ample chest and began to pull. This brought the giantess back to consciousness from the sheer tormenting pain. There was a sickening ripping sound like wet cloth being torn as the plate was pulled away from her body. Her fluorescent green blood began to spurt and spray from numerous tears in her skin. Her unbroken arm made a final, feeble attempt to save herself and then the entire plate came free with a wet squelching pop. Aimi collapsed back to the ground and was still. Stargazer carelessly tossed the armor plate into the distance then turned back to Aimi and punched the unresponsive form a couple more times, the final punch caved in her face, eliminating any possibility that Aimi was still alive.
Inside the hatch, Koko’s entire body was soaked in sweat, her clothes sticking to her uncomfortably and the small room seemed unbearably hot and humid. She felt her body begin to heat up and the sensation in her leg began to transform itself into indescribable agony as nausea overtook her and she retched up the food she had eaten hours ago. Looking down she saw the cause; she now had an extra knee in her leg. She suddenly realized she couldn’t keep from passing out much longer. She raised the control device to her mouth desperately trying to get a final order out before she collapsed, “Stargazer, take us home, I need medical attention.” The robot stood from Aimi’s gigantic corpse and launched itself into the sky. At Unicorn Headquarters they could only hope Koko was on her way back.
After several moments it became clear something was wrong. The robot hovered in place, casting its collapsed head around the area, as if it did not know where to go.
“Something’s wrong with the robot,” Mamoru said. Then continued, “I mean, something ELSE.”
“There is probably a fault with the homing system, it was located in the head,” the UAV tech offered.
The Commander folded his arms across his chest, considering the situation for about 30 seconds. “Have the UAV try to get the robot’s attention, if successful lead it back,” he told the UAV pilot.
The pilot replied in the affirmative and flew the UAV around the robot’s head a couple of times. On the third orbit the robot finally seemed to realize the vehicle’s purpose and turned to follow it.
It took the robot forty minutes to fly back to Unicorn HQ. Rather than the usual controlled landing, the robot slammed to the ground on the landing pad and nearly fell forward on its face, dropping to its hands and knees before steadying itself. The maintenance hatch popped open, but Koko did not emerge. Mr. Wallace quickly had a ladder thrown up and was the first into the bay, finding Koko completely unconscious with a badly broken leg. “MEDIC!!!!” he cried out.
Eighteen hours later Koko was sleeping in the Wallace’s spare room once again. The pain medication had left her incoherent, so it was deemed unsafe to send her home alone and Mrs. Wallace had insisted on taking her in for a night or two. Her leg was badly broken, and she would be unable to walk for weeks.
However, her sleep was not peaceful, she was having The Dreams again, the ones about her family. As The Dreams progressed, she began to thrash in bed, the emotional agony overriding the drugs’ ability to calm her down.
Billy had gotten up late in the evening to go to the bathroom. The spare room Koko was staying in was in between his room and the bathroom. As he returned to his comfortably warm bed, he heard Koko moaning and thrashing in her room. Confused, Daddy had told him Koko would sleep without making a sound, he pushed open the door to look in on her. “Big Sister Koko?” He peaked around the door, for some reason he wasn’t supposed to be in a room with a girl at night, but he didn’t understand why and saw his friend tossing and turning in the bed. She was mumbling words and moaning. It sounded like she was crying. Worried, he walked over to her to try and help if he could. As he reached her, she called out in a loud voice: “AKITO!!!! WHERE ARE YOU??” Shocked, Billy froze, but only for a second. He recovered and reached out to her laying his hand on her forehead, like his mom did when he had a nightmare, and spoke, “Big Sister Koko, are you having a bad dream?”
He didn’t notice that his parents had come to the door in response to Koko’s outbursts because as soon as the words were out of his mouth Koko’s body surged upright and she seized him in a powerful embrace, dragging him off the floor and onto the bed with her.
“AKITO!!!! WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN??? I’VE MISSED YOU SO MUCH!!!!” She was sobbing uncontrollably, rocking back and forth, and hugging him so tightly it seemed like she was trying to absorb him. Mr. and Mrs. Wallace looked on in shock, unsure what was going on.
“How could you play such a mean prank on me,” Koko sobbed. “The policeman said you were dead.” And then like a spell broken, Koko ceased moving, her face which had been pressed against Billy’s turned towards the light from the hallway, and she saw the two shapes there, “Mom, Dad…..?”
The realization dawned on the Wallace’s as Koko came to full wakefulness, becoming aware of where she was and what she was doing. The last remnants of the haze of her sleep left her as she turned back to the boy in her arms, “Where’s Akito?” Billy was clearly upset – and clearly not Akito. Crying once again, she tucked her face into Billy’s chest and this time he joined her.
