Oliver Davis knew as soon as he had found out his wife was pregnant that when they came to disciplining their child, he would be the bad cop and she would most definitely be the good cop.

His reasoning had come from how they had dealt with Ayami-chan on that case all those years ago. So far, his hypothesis had been correct.

So when his six year old daughter came storming into his home office without even knocking one evening, he was very surprised to hear that his wife had done the shouting.

"Himeko, why did you not knock?" He asked quietly, not looking up from his work.

"I need help with these two kanji, I don't know these ones." She huffed, shoving the book under his nose and pointing.

"Haven't we had this discussion? Your mother knows a lot more about kanji than I do." Oliver replied.

"I'm not talking to your wife. She shouted at me." Himeko said crossly, folding her arms across her chest and pouting. Oliver had to refrain from chuckling at the use of the words 'your wife'.

"What did she shout at you for?" He asked reasonably.

"Well I was telling her about my day at school." Himeko began. "I was telling her about the new boy and how he was being really dumb and that I had told him he was being an idiot. And then mum shouted at me for calling people stupid and idiotic. But he was being stupid!" She protested loudly.

Oliver sighed.

"Your mother had a tough day at work." He explained. "Her boss likes to point out idiots and she's currently rather annoyed at her boss." Himeko frowned.

"Aren't you her boss?"

"Yes."

"So she's annoyed with you."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I told her she can't go on any cases for a while." Oliver said.

"Why?" Himeko asked again, but didn't give him time to answer. "Is it because she hurt her ankle on the last case?"

"It's to do with that."

"But she hurts herself on all the cases, you can't stop her because of that, it's mean!"

Oliver studied his daughter for a moment. She was glaring up at him with the same facial expression his wife would. In fact, Himeko looked very much like her mother. Or rather, as if someone had taken his wife's body and coloured it in differently. Black hair instead of brown, blue eyes instead of brown and slightly paler skin tone. But they were definitely her features.

Oliver patted his lap and allowed his daughter to climb up.

"What if your mother might hurt someone else with her actions? Then would you condone me stopping her?"

"But mum would never hurt anyone else deliberately! And Auntie Ayako and everyone else knows she doesn't mean to cause trouble!" Himeko said.

"I know she wouldn't, but-"

"Do you mean because she gets hurt, it hurts you because you love her?"

"Well there is that too, but that's not the main issue here."

"Then who else is she hurting?" Himeko asked with wide eyes.

Oliver sighed, amused by how hard his daughter was trying to work it out. But he wasn't sure he wanted to have this conversation right now. It could raise awkward questions that he really did not want to answer.

"Do you want to know a secret about your mother?" He asked and his daughter nodded. "When your mother finds out about something that upsets her, in this case finding out she can't take cases for a while, she does the same thing every time. First, she gets sad, then she gets angry, then she calms down and finally she will become optimistic."

"What does optimistic mean?"

"Happy, looking forward to things, looking on the bright side."

"That sounds like mum."

"It does." Oliver agreed. "I think you just caught her when she was angry and because you reminded her of her boss, she shouted at you."

"Oh." Himeko said, still frowning.

"She'll probably come running in any minute looking for you so she can apologise."

As if on cue, the pair heard a frightened shout from outside Oliver's office before Mai Davis burst into the room shouting.

"Naru! Himeko's not in her room! I can't…" She faltered as she saw her daughter sat on her husband's lap.

"Didn't I tell you?" Oliver said knowingly, switching to English just to annoy his wife.

"Do you two have to have secret conversations I can't understand?" Mai pouted.

"She doesn't seem to understand that that is why we do it…" Oliver added to his daughter.

Himeko giggled before looking up at her mother.

"I'm sorry for calling that boy an idiot." She said sincerely.

"You are so like your father." Mai said smiling, hands on her hips. "He always liked stealing the best bits. I was about to apologise to you!"

Himeko slipped off her father's lap and ran into her mother's arms. Then, breaking away from the embrace, she turned back to her father.

"Is it because the person she might hurt can't say anything? They can't say it hurts?"

"That's a lot closer to the truth." Oliver replied, ignoring his wife's frown. "Why don't you ask your mother where babies come from? That might clear some things up."

"Will do! Goodnight daddy!" Himeko grinned. She took her mother's hand and led her from the office. "Mummy, where do babies come from?" Oliver heard his daughter asking as they left.

Oliver smiled and looked down at the book Himeko had left on his desk. She had pointed earlier to the two kanji that made up a very important word: family.

And his was about to expand.

Author's note: I wrote this as an apology to everyone who read Angel - if you haven't read it, do it and you'll see why this was necessary! Please review!