O-Ren stood there in her pajamas, a pale blue yukata worn to threadbare softness, her swords slung haphazardly on each side. She'd been awake and the sounds had come to her too. Her shoes were already neatly on the front step, her feet bare as she crept forward.
Her eyes flickered around the room, taking in the lack of evidence that there had been a struggle or violence.
It took three swallows, but Dean's voice was steady when he answered. "They're gone, O-Ren." Against his shoulder Cori shifted fitfully, though she couldn't have understood the finality in the statement. "They went home."
O-Ren dropped to her knees beside him. "Muzukashii, ne?" Her voice was a little shaky, a little forced with bravado. "An orphan." She reached out, her fingertips grazing Cori's head. "But she'll be alright."
She blinked hard, keeping the wetness back from her eyes.
For a terrifying moment Dean's eyes burned, aching with a sudden swell of tears he absolutely would not let gather and fall. "She's got family," he said, not quite so steadily as before. "We're all alright."
"Hera's gone too," O-Ren whispered, as if just realizing the little girl she'd been allowed to babysit, as if she herself were a normal girl, was no longer there. She slumped off her knees, scooting up beside Dean. "She has you," she adds. "And all of us."
"Yeah," Dean exhaled, dropping the arm not holding Cori to him around O-Ren's shoulders. Maybe he ought to have been proud or grateful that O-Ren could bear this with the same tenuous hold on calm that he could, but it only hurt to think that O-Ren shouldn't be this adept, should never have had to learn it as young as she was.
O-Ren is still for a moment, but then curls up against his side, her hand going back to stroke the top of Cori's head. "Sou desu. And we'll take good care of her. Teach her everything she needs to know."
O-Ren's smaller body was warm against his side, and Dean was too worn down by the events of one short morning to be ashamed for the comfort it gave him. "I've..." he began slowly. "I've done this before. It'll be easier this time."
Saying it made him feel better, which was why he'd said it at all, but it was surprising to realize how much that was true. "It's gonna change things around our place."
"Oh," she said quietly. Even now, especially with another disappearance looming against the horizon, she couldn't help but have that first flash of fear that it endangers her and her spot as well. "If you need more space...."
It was a dangling, worried ellipses that hangs heavily in the air, just like her mother had spoken. She hated herself for giving in to it. "I'll do whatever I need to do."
"Be prepared to lose some sleep," said Dean, carefully nudging his shoulder like he knew what she was thinking. O-Ren was already poised and ready to accept her abandonment. "Maybe help us put a new room on the hut. Help us lock up all the weapons good and tight."
O-Ren nodded, not quite daring to put out what she was really thinking-- not because she couldn't trust him, but because she couldn't make those words come out. "I'd never let anything happen to her," she said, and then more shyly, "I always wondered what it would be like to have a baby sister."
O-Ren stood there in her pajamas, a pale blue yukata worn to threadbare softness, her swords slung haphazardly on each side. She'd been awake and the sounds had come to her too. Her shoes were already neatly on the front step, her feet bare as she crept forward.
Her eyes flickered around the room, taking in the lack of evidence that there had been a struggle or violence.
"Where are they?"
She suddenly sounded very young.
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She blinked hard, keeping the wetness back from her eyes.
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"And there's a lot of us, isn't there?"
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Saying it made him feel better, which was why he'd said it at all, but it was surprising to realize how much that was true. "It's gonna change things around our place."
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It was a dangling, worried ellipses that hangs heavily in the air, just like her mother had spoken. She hated herself for giving in to it. "I'll do whatever I need to do."
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