~Tsubasa~

I've been thinking about something for weeks now. Ever since I heard Cogs call Madoka 'mom' for the first time. It was a good moment, but Cogs needs a dad...right?

Why shouldn't that be me?

What we have is real. Unfailingly, alarmingly real. Call me sentimental - very, very sentimental - but I never want this to end. We should be together forever, I think.

There is only one obstacle that could possibly hinder my plan: Yuu. He seems very pouty about all of this.

It's early morning; he stumbles into our kitchen with his pyjamas still on, reaching for his marshmallow cereal. I sit down at the other end of the table and start to talk.

~Yuu~

"Hey." I look up to the other end of our rinky dinky little chipped up table to where Tsubasa is sitting. I woke up really happy today because...well, I don't know why. Maybe because waking up is one of the only times where Madoka isn't here.

"Hey", I say back, because I like to copy him sometimes.

"Hey, Yuu, did you ever want a mom?"

My head snaps up like it's on a snappy string. What? "Why do you ask?"

"Well..." He taps his fingers on the coffee cup, tap, tap, tap. "When you get to be my age, and you meet a special person, you fall in love, right?"

"I don't know."

"You do. That's what happens, when you're an adult", he says like a grownup. He always talks like a grownup when he's trying to tell me stuff I already know.

"How do you know? Maybe you're not really in love", I say in a little voice, pretending to look at my cereal.

"Uh...I'm pretty sure, Yuu", he laughs. "It's hard to mistake. But anyway", he continues, "When grownups fall in love, they naturally want to get married. Right?"

MARRIED!? No! They can't do that! Can they?"

"Why...why do you ask?"

"Yuu. I think you know", he says, looking deeeep, deeeep into my eyes. When he does this I can never look away.

"Are you gonna...get married to Madoka?" My voice comes out in a teeny tiny baby whisper.

"Haha...I was thinking about it", he says, getting all pink, like he does whenever she is around. "I was going to tell you first so you're not upset when it happens."

I'm already upset. I don't want...

"I don't..."

"Hey. Are you OK?"

Burning, burning, burning up, I'm so FRUSTRATED! I've been trying to let him see forever that this is NOT OK WITH ME!

"NO!" I stand up on my chair. "I'm not ok!"

"Yuu - "

"I don't like this, not one little single tiny bit! I don't like it! I thought it was just gonna be you and me!"

"Things change", he says firmly. "You can't expect me to stay single forever! I can't live like that, and neither can you!"

"Why!?" I want to know why!

"I need somebody. And you do too. I can't be a mom and a dad for you, Yuu."

"Why not?" Little tears splash in my cereal. "You were doing a good job before."

"No, I wasn't", he says gently. "I've been gone most of the time. With Madoka here, things could be better. You could have someone to watch over you all the time, have a real home life."

I stamp my feet. "NO! I don't want you to! I don't need watching over!"

He rises up from the table. "Well guess what? I'm an adult, and you aren't going to stop me from getting married if I want! You'll just have to deal with it, Yuu!"

"No I won't! You can't make me do anything!" I will be brave.

He grabs my arm and pulls me down from the chair. "I am your legal guardian, and you WILL listen to me." His face is madder than I've seen it in ages. "Get your backpack. We're going."

"But - "

"Now." He grabs my cereal and pours it all down the sink, it's soggy anyway, and we spent too much time arguing here. "Get out of your pyjamas. Go!" he snaps. So I go.

While he's not looking, I put Libra and some more clothes in my backpack. If he isn't going to listen to me, I may as well go. I've done training journeys on my own before. He can't stop me; he'll see. And he'll be sorry.

And maybe, just maybe, then I will come back.