All In All

Junko was amused but decided to leave it alone. "That's a good plan. I can do this for a while, but its been a while since I had a dedicated jog. Naoki will probably burn out in another minute or so."

* *

"Honestly?" Emanulle started. "I just wanted to get to know you more. I don't expect either of us to spill each others life stories but I want to start somewhere..if you let me."

Kirito nodded a bit to that, glancing around. "Well, at the current pace, she'll start to slow down after the next time she laps us. I was already training before you two woke up, so you can keep going once she wears herself out, I'll stop and talk to her."

~~~~~

Kaori seemed to frown. "I don't understand you. Why are you so fixated on me?" She paused, and shook her head. She opened the door just a bit more, and slipped outside, locking the door behind her. "Fine, we can talk. Lead the way I guess."

True to Kirito's words, Naoki was starting to slow down after she passed them up again. She was starting to realize she had pushed herself maybe a bit too much in her haste to impress Kirito so she slowed down from before. Samara didn't need to train, Naoki thought. That was because she didn't really get tired normally like they did far as she knew so her stamina couldn't really be improved on.

* *

Emanulle was a bit surprised she decided to come but this gave him a chance at any rate. After she came out, he began to lead, putting his hands into his pockets. Where to go? He wasn't sure and to an extent, he guessed it didn't matter. Here, he wasn't trying pry open her dark secrets or anything he was just trying to get to know her.

Was he being selfish?

That idea had came to mind at one time briefly before it was quashed. When he first met Kaori his desire to get to know her had been sincere then and it was now. The only difference was there another, important reason for doing so: his daughter Michru and the rest of those he cared about.

Kirito and Junko soon caught up to the now tiring Naoki, and Kirito then slowed down to stay with Naoki, placing a hand on her shoulder and slowing her further to a more relaxed pace. "Alright, don't stop suddenly, do it gradually..." He guided her in slowly bringing herself down from her run in a way that was healthy. Soon, they were moving at a calm walk. "There. Now, Naoki? Why did you run off like that? It's important to do stretches and the like, to warm up your muscles. You're lucky you didn't cramp up." He was trying to be firm, but gentle in how he did this. He didn't want Naoki to become upset with herself or anything.

~~~~~

Kaori just calmly followed Emanulle, not saying anything. She would look around occasionally, but other than that, seemed to be in her own little world. Eventually, however, she seemed to get impatient. "If you are not going to say anything, I'm going home. You're wasting my time."

Naoki blushed both to his touch and his words. "We'll.." She began. "I wanted to prove I could do it and impress you I guess. I'm sorry I didn't mean to over do it like I did."

* *

Emanulle noted the area was secluded, which meant they could talk without worry..for the most part. In a world like this you never honestly knew. He turned to Kaori. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to waste your time, I'll get to the point now. I don't know the whole details..but I know something is up. I'm not going to get in your way, at the same time let me help. I suppose a lot of things I'll be out of the loop of until and if you ever trust me with whatever is going on. But in some of your battles that aren't as case sensitive..then I want to help."

Kirito sighed. "You don't need to try and impress me, Naoki. I'm already impressed with you. Do you realize what you did when you chose to become a Puella Magi and fight Witches? You chose to risk your life to fight beings you didn't understand; all you knew was that they were hurting people. Do you realize how brave that is? You could have continued to live a normal life and let others fight the battles, but instead you chose to help. If you think about it, you're braver than me. When the Death Game started, I was out to save myself. I'd help people if they were in front of me, but my priority was to keep myself alive. It wasn't until later that I started fighting for the sake of others. I already had some experience with the game before the Death Game started, anyway. You dove right into a fight you had no experience with, simply to help others. That takes courage, Naoki, and I couldn't possibly NOT be impressed with you."

~~~~~

Kaori gave him a flat look. "So you want to get involved in something you know absolutely nothing about, where you are not even welcome. You want to 'help.' You have no idea what you'd be helping with, aside from fighting. For all you know, I'm the villain here. You're either a fool, or you have a death wish. All you'd be to me is another burden to bear, more guilt to deal with. I've had enough of that."

To Naoki, hearing that more then surprised her. "..I..we'll I never really thought of it that way before really. Thank you for that Kirito, I promise I won't over do it next time. My mom said being brave means doing things even when you're scared."

* *

To that, Emanulle sighed slightly. "I have my reasons just like you have yours, Kaori. Regardless its a open offer." He turned to walk away but paused briefly. "I have strong reason to believe my daughter will be connected to all this: which leads to you. Whether you help me or not doesn't matter. You're not the only one with something to protect."

Kirito nodded, smiling. "She's right. And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't terrified during some of my battles." 'Honestly, I'm scared right now. I don't even know what is going to happen this month that has apparently killed everyone in every previous loop...' He shook his head. "Anyway, take a break while we wait for Junko to finish, alright?"

~~~~~

Kaori tensed a bit. "...How old is she? Your daughter."

Naoki simply nodded her head, relaxing as she sat down. She wondered if there was anyone who wasn't scared when they fought? Maybe Mr. Enma. They didn't seem scared of anything but she really didn't know them.

It wasn't too long before Junko finished and proceeded to come over.

* *

Emanulle stopped his walk for a moment. "..She's about four."

Kirito turned and smiled at Junko as she came over, only to suddenly turn his head away without warning, and he covered his mouth as he coughed. This was actually to try and cover his embarrassment. His eyes had glanced to a place they shouldn't have, and now he was at least fairly sure that Junko wasn't wearing a bra. Not 100% sure, but he wasn't going to dwell on that. Honestly, he was quickly learning that the only safe place to look right now was probably Naoki and Junko's feet and hair, as everywhere else was a bit embarrassing for him. He couldn't afford for them to notice, either.

He was aware that Naoki seemed to like him. He couldn't pretend that there wasn't something there on his end either, but he felt he couldn't get involved with her. At least not now, when he wasn't being completely honest with her about who he was, and when he wasn't even sure if he'd be able to stick around. He couldn't get involved when it could potentially hurt her later. As for Junko... she was a grown woman, whose daughter liked him. Not to mention the fact that he was surely at least half her age. She'd likely be upset if she realized his discomfort. 'At least I'm not having one of THOSE reactions... I'd never be able to hide that in these shorts.' He cleared his throat, turning back to Junko and keeping his eyes firmly on her hairline. "Alright, now that you're done, we'll do some simple exercises to build a bit of muscle and tone the body. Also... hm, Naoki, if you want to get into using a melee weapon... I wouldn't suggest a fighting style built on strength, but instead on agility and grace. A more free-flowing style requires balance, flexibility, and focus, so maybe yoga would do you some good... couldn't hurt for Junko to do it either, it's a workout in itself, and healthy... plus you could do it together, which usually makes things more enjoyable than by yourself...." He was getting into deeper thought, seemingly spacing out as he was mulling over the merits of the idea.

Then, suddenly, disaster. At least, in his opinion. For right then, the image of Naoki and Junko doing certain yoga poses, Downward Facing Dog for example, came to focus in his mind. The noise Kirito made as he was shocked out of his thinking was something like a cross between a laugh, a hiccup, and perhaps a agonized groan. It was hard to pinpoint, other than that it sounded ridiculous and somewhat painful, and Kirito promptly pinched the bridge of his nose, sitting up straight. "...Ahem... yes, yoga would probably help.... yes. I don't do it myself, but the merits are there, and it shouldn't be hard to find someone to start teaching you two...." He had no plans of joining them in this; he wasn't stupid. Things were already hard enough for him as is.... he really hoped that wasn't an inadvertent pun.

~~~~~

Kaori blinked, and looked up at the sky. "Ten years... in ten years she could be like us... just another pawn on their board..." She hadn't realized she'd spoken out loud, though it was so soft Emanulle would only barely hear it.

"Why not join us?" Naoki suggested brightly, no really aware of any potential problems Kirito might have.

"..Sweetie, he's a growing young man." Junko said simply.

Naoki gave a confused cute expression. "I don't understand."

She sighed. "I'll say it like this. Us in skimpy clothes doing poses get reactions, get it?"

"Oh.."

Then it clicked more and she turned a bright red. "Um s-sorry Kirito shouldn't have brought it up."

* *

Emanulle turned around fully then. "..So you know what might happen to her then."

Kirito was mortified. He wasn't sure if Junko had simply put two and two together, or if she had completely figured out his current discomfort. Either way, the discussion of the topic, and Naoki's reaction, made him palm his face. "It.... it's okay, Naoki... it's not your fault..." The logical part of his mind kicked in shortly after, even if he'd prefer it hadn't. If they were going to keep training for any length of time, this issue needed to be addressed. He cleared his throat, and tried to keep his embarrassment from showing too much. "I... alright, listen. If we are going to continue this sort of training, we'll have to clear the air a bit. As... as Junko stated, I'm... well, a young man, so of course I'm going to have some trouble from time to time. I'm admittedly not used to this. I've trained with women before, but... it was different. Suguha is my sister, Asuna has become like a sister to me..." He paused, and sighed.

"I can only apologize, I guess. I'll do the best I can to focus solely on helping you both train, but I can't help how I'll react to certain things. Still, I won't allow it to interfere, so please don't worry about that..." It never really occurred to him that anything he did might get a reaction out of either of them, but then again, he didn't usually think about such things.

~~~~~

Kaori paused, looking him in the eyes. "So do you. You know a lot more that you were letting on. More than you should. How?"

Junko shook her head. "If you say you can handle it, we'll continue. I just wanted to make sure you had a handle of things. I'm not really into yoga but I can see the benefits of working with it."

* *

Emanulle hesistated. Should he?

He should. He couldn't just not say anything.

"..It's a few things I figured out on my own and a bit of help.." He then told her about how he came to the conclusions he did but he left out the part about Kirito being a Myriad Crusader, of course.

Kirito nodded slightly. He was glad that Junko was understanding of things. "I'll see if I can find someone to lead your instruction in yoga then. For now though, we'll just do some simple exercises. Push-ups, crunches, things like that. There's no point in getting into actual combat training until you're conditioned for it."

~~~~~

Kaori's eyes narrowed a bit. She did not like the sound of this, and she'd need to investigate. For now, though... "...I see. So you know a great deal more about things than I thought you would... but you still think you can help. If you know about the times this has happened... all of my failures, then what makes you think things will be any different this time?"

Naoki tried not to cringe. "Um..how many push ups would we have to do starting off?"

* *

"Because I'm a new factor. You ever hear of the Ripple Effect? Of one tiny small event ends up making drastic changes? I'm willing to bet, considering where we come from Adell, we'll the Adell where I'm from along with Ignis and the rest are new to this as well."

Then they sighed. "Besides that, I don't have a choice. Adell and his circle are basically family to me as well, and with Mami and Kyouko there it means I'll be involved with this in one form or another. Then there's my own daughter. So you see, the moment I found out I didn't have a choice to sit out even if I wanted to."

Kirito smiled a bit. "For this first time, do as many as you can. I need to see how many you can do, so I can figure out a good baseline for you both."

~~~~~

Kaori paused at that. "...It's even more lives to weigh on me, in my mind. Now that you and the others are around, I have to make sure you all survive as well... otherwise people I care about will suffer... I learned a long time ago that I can't save everyone, but I won't settle for anything less than the people I care about being safe and happy...."

Naoki began doing push ups, but was really struggling after about five. Junko on the other hand was doing far more then her daughter was but was starting to slow down after about ten push ups. Naoki eventually collapsed, red faced and embarrassed. She had thought she'd be able to at least do a bit more then what she had.

* *

Emanulle nodded. "We're the same in that sense then. I'm connected to Naoki and the others through Kyouko and Mami so that sort of goes for both of us. I can't be everywhere at once so that makes things harder."

Kirito didn't say anything about it, but he was just a bit disappointed. He'd thought they could do more than that. Then again, he had to remind himself, he grew up being trained by his grandfather. As far as he knew, Naoki and Junko had fairly easy lives in that area. "Alright, that gives me a better idea of a starting point for you both. Next is crunches. After that, we'll do some cool down stretches and walking to wrap things up. Naoki, due to your new healing factor, it will help you get stronger faster, since your muscles will recover faster. Junko, the best I can offer is a bit of healing magic. It won't be as effective, but it will still help."

~~~~~

Kaori was silent for a long moment. "...Considering the situation, I can't make you stay out of it. You have just as much reason to fight as I do... I guess I have no choice but to accept your help... let's return to my apartment, I'll tell you what we are going to be up against, what we need to watch for... and who is really to blame..."

Naoki felt a bit of apprehension at the news but pushed it away. She was determined to get this over with even if she passed out. Besides, she fought Witches before and had came back alive. If she could do that then some training wasn't going to kill her off.

* *

"All right. Lead the way." Emanulle shoved his hands into his pockets, content to follow.

When training was finally over, Kirito was stretching a bit still, smiling. "This went pretty well I think. I think if we do this every day, preferably in the mornings, it will do you both really well. Get that yoga instructor for you both too... hm...."

~~~~~

Kaori simply nodded, and turned on her heel, heading off. She had no idea that Emanulle had already heard about the truth of Kyubey from Syndra, but she didn't need to know that.

Junko watched him from the corner of her eye. "What is it Kirito? You seem to be thinking of something?"

* *

When it was all said and done with the talks over, Emanulle had left Kaori for now but cited he'd come back to talk to her and meet up with her later. He headed back home so he could spend time with Michru but at the current time she wanted to go outside. Never able to say no for too long he decided to go along with it. Besides that, he made it a habit to spend as much time as he could with her during down time.

The park didn't have too much people there at the moment, which was fine. On their way they got some ice cream before having a seat. Though, on the way, Michru had spilled it and some had gotten on her shirt. She couldn't speak but she was obviously upset.

Manny sighed but shook his head with a small smile, taking out a napkin. "Don't worry about it. Accidents happen and we'll get another one. Okay?"

Michru nodded, wiping her eyes.

It really wasn't a an uncommon sight, seeing a parent comforting their child over a small accident. People saw such things all the time, it was normal. However, for one beautiful woman who had been sitting on a nearby bench, reflecting on where she had gone wrong, it was more than that. It was a reminder of what she had lost only recently, and for a reason she couldn't begin to understand. The scene that should have been heartwarming only made the woman's heart ache, and she choked back a sob, looking away.

Emanulle wiped Michru up before hearing something close to a sob. Frowning he turned towards the source to find a young woman that for some reason reminded him of Kaori. "Miss, are you okay?"

The woman looked up, tears already threatening to spill before she tried in vain to wipe them away. "N-no, I'm... I'm okay, d-don't... don't mind me. Please, don't let me r-ruin your day." She forced a nervous little laugh, moving to leave. "It's not your fault I'm... you two h-have a nice day..."

Emanulle didn't know the woman, or what she was about but it was his nature to what he could to help if someone was right in front of him with a problem. There was also something bugging him, of why this woman seemed so..familar. "Wait. Do you know someone named Kaori?"

Michru peered at the stranger curiously from behind.