"Don't." That was all I could say. I looked at her so hard and passionately that the rest of the world seemed to fade into the background. All that mattered was the beautiful woman in front of me.

            "Don't what?" She asked. She knew what I meant, but she still asked anyway. She wanted to know how I could word this.     

"Don't do something we'll regret." I said.

"In a worst case scenario, I won't have the ability to regret anything. In a best, neither of us will regret anything." She responded.

"I…" I started. I knew how goddamn selfish I was acting. Here she was, selflessly offering herself to buy us some time to escape, saving all of our lives, and I was being a real asshole, saying she couldn't. Mai Valentine was certainly capable of buying us the time we needed, but that left a question: What would happen to her? None of us would be back here to help her. I knew that Mai was independent; she wouldn't have accepted our help even if she was broken and battered.

"Then don't do something I'll regret."

"Joey, give me this." She ordered. "I've…I've only ever lived for myself. It's a bleak, depressing existence. I don't care about my real family; all of you are the closest thing to that I have. And with family, you look out for each other. This is the first time I'm ever doing something that's not for myself, and I'm going to do it. I don't fucking care if you want me to or not."

That wasn't true for two reasons. The first was that she wanted to save us, and so that was for herself too. And the second? The second was that she had gone off on her own to fight for me before. She lost, but she had done so. Back in America, when she was brainwashed by Dartz.

"I don't care if you want it. I'm going to be as fucking selfish as I want! I'm not going to let you do this!" Mai elbowed me in the stomach, and I felt the wind rush out of me.

"You don't have a choice, kid." She told me.

"No, Mai!" I shouted. "You could die!" I shouted. This was the first time that any of us had mentioned that d word. I hoped it would faze her, Mai loved life more then any of us, I thought.

But she looked ahead.

"Then let the flowers be white roses, and the woman be Mai Valentine. You better not cry." She commanded. Barking out orders to me for her funeral.

"Don't you fucking talk like that!" I shouted. Man, I was so tense; I would have punched her out to stop her. Mai ignored me, and looked straight ahead.

"It's…it's time for you to go." She said simply.

"No. I promised you that I would never let you get hurt, back when Marik destroyed your mind. I failed once, I won't fucking fail again."

"I don't care about your promises. I'm releasing you from it. I don't need to be rescued or saved or anything like that. You want to make me happy, you fucking get out of here and don't look back."

"I'm not till you are." I said. Mai elbowed me again.

"Get moving, kid!" Again with calling me kid. I knew she was really mad with me, but again, I could fucking care less. Not with Mai so close to dying.

"Nope." I said like a dork. "I'm the last one to leave."

"Why won't you let me do this?" She asked. "Why won't you let me do something for good?"

"Because I'm a selfish asshole who always gets what he wants, and I don't want you to die." I said. Maybe this frank bluntness would help, somehow. She smiled, did it work?

"That's not good enough. I want you all to live." Mai returned.

"I want us all to live too, and that includes you." I shot back.

"Joey…I've never really done anything good with my life. I won't beg for it. Hell, I won't fight for it. I'll fight for yours, because you have a chance not to fuck up." I didn't know what to say, or rather, I knew what to say, but I didn't know how to say it.

I tried to just be frank again.

"Just because you've messed up doesn't mean you've lost it forever. I would help you until I can't help you anymore to get the life you want." Mai looked at me intently.

"I've told you before that I don't need any help."

"Just because you don't need it doesn't mean I don't want to."

"You can want all you want, I'd never take it. I must fight on my own. That's the way I've chosen." She responded.

"People can change, hearts can change." I said. "Please, Mai. I know you're independent; I want you to be independent, but I want you to live with that independence. What good is pride and strength when you're dead."

"It just might get me to heaven." She responded. "I'll find out."

"Not now." I ordered.

"Are you still spouting that shit?" She asked.

"Shit, schmit. Maybe so, but I'm not going to let you just throw away your life like that. I'd…I'd rather fight myself."

"Oh, so I can't kill myself to save you all, but you can?" She asked.

"No…that's not what I mean at all." I said. "It means that that's what I would rather do. I'm…I'm not letting either of us do this. Because of my selfishness, I'm not going to let you hurt yourself, and because I cannot be a hypocrite, I won't stay here in your place. So…" And then, although I'm not sure how I did it, I grabbed Mai by the arms, turned around so that our arms were locked and we were back to back, and I bent my back forward, lifting her off of the ground.

"What the fuck are you doing!" Mai shouted, her legs thrashing in the air. I'm sure the sight must've been hilarious, but now was not the time for laughing as I, with tremendous difficulty, carried the complaining woman I loved more then anything away.

When I thought we were safe, I put her down, and the first thing she did was slap me across the face. She slapped me so hard that she knocked me down.

"Asshole!" She shouted, kicking me while I was down. Man, she could be a downright bitch, even when I saved her life. But still, I wasn't complaining. I'd rather take her bitching then putting white roses on her grave.

When she got tired of beating the crap out of me, I got up and we walked together.

"Hey look, cherry blossoms." I said, plucking one from the nearby tree. I threaded the beautiful flower into her hair. Before she could talk again.

"Mai, how about this be our flower?" I said, taking another one from the tree and slipping it into the buttonhole of my shirt. Mai didn't say anything, just leaned her head on my shoulder as we walked towards the rising sun. I was so happy she was safe that I wasn't paying attention to the bruises she'd given me, and although I'm sure she'd never say it to me, I'm sure that she was happy we were both safe.

Because both of us had problems in our lives to fix, problems that running away to death wouldn't solve. Problems that we couldn't fix ourselves, and even with Mai's stubborn independence, I was going to help her fix it.