Notes: This is probably the last post in this story for a while. After 8, the only one that's written is 11, and since this fic isn't terribly popular, I'm kind of demotivated to work on it at the moment, so it'll start up again later. Just...not today. Don't worry, it won't be TOO long, I promise.

This drabble is not my favorite, but it was the first idea that came to mind for the prompt. And I ADORE the Shun/June dynamic. I love how smart they are about their relationship, and how they don't need to go through a lot of angst and whatever. I love the scene where June's mask comes off and Shun just smiles at her and nods, and they seem to know exactly what they want to do about the mask's love/death thing.

Thank you ever so much to Ran, and Naotoki "nee-san" for leaving me reviews of the previous chapter.

Ran: I have to ask, does your screenname have anything to do with the Ran from Weiss Kreuz?

Anywho, leave one if you like it.

8. Fragile

The first time she saw him, she wanted to protect him. He was so adorable, so breakable, so prone to tears and so needful. She thought anyone would want to hold that cute little boy in their arms and shelter him from the sweltering heat and the nighttime freeze, from the cruelty of their peers and the separation from his brother, and from the aches and bruises of their unrelenting training.

And who better to do it than her? She had been there before him, she could deal with pain, and she had always managed to stand on her own. She was strong. So she tried to shield him through the years, with everything she had.

One day, she fell. One day he stood up and made a miracle and showed he could fight better than anyone as long as he had a reason to do so.

When June woke up alone in the hospital and found herself crying in fear for him, she suddenly saw that she had gotten it completely wrong. She had never needed to protect him at all. He was not the fragile one.