Miwa woke up with a start, lunging out of bed before clutching her head in pain. Looking to her side, she saw Mechamaru and Kamo looking at her with relative concern, as well as Mai and Momo standing around.
"Thank goodness you're awake, Kasumi!" Mechamaru said.
"The doctor wasn't sure what to do about you when he examined you", Kamo said, breathing a sigh of relief. "To be honest, I wasn't too sure myself."
"Ah . . . what was wrong?" Miwa said, dazed.
"Your cursed energy was fluctuating", Mechamaru said.
"It was quite scary, not ladylike at all", Momo said, shuddering at the memory.
"Fluctuating?"
"Yeah, fluctuating," Mechamaru said. "At times, it was almost zero."
"Zero?!"
"I cannot stress enough how close you were to death, Kasumi. I ask you, as a friend, that you never do that again, unless you need to."
"Yes . . ."
Mechamaru grasped Kasumi's shoulders a bit tightly.
"I mean it. Please, unless your certain there's no other way or you believe your strong enough, never do it to that extent.
"Muta-kun, my shoulders . . ."
"Apologies."
Miwa rubbed her shoulders a bit, before smiling a bit. "Still, it's nice to know that y'all are worrying about me."
"Of course we would be worried for you, your our friend!" Todou said, chuckling a bit. "Though your type of woman is quite average-"
"Maybe because I'm straight," Miwa deadpanned, to the slight chuckle of momo and Mai.
"You're so pure, your like a calming oasis of kindness and goodness that just being around you is refreshing!"
" Thanks!" Miwa smiled as she ran cursed energy throughout her body.
They do care for me. Huh.
There was not a lot of it, but there was doubt that her friends were fine with her lack of ability. As they didn't bring up the exchange event, Miwa took it as a sign that her feelings of being mocked for her weakness dissipated.
It didn't change anything though. She was still a liability, and while they might not mind her being weak, she did.
She'd work on rectifying it with the information that they loved her anyway, is all.
"Ok, I seem to be fine. Just let me get up from this bed and—"
"Rest or I knock you out myself," Mai said, as momo cracked her knuckles and readied her broom like a Caribbean mom who just learned her son was skipping school to do pan-band activities and the band wasn't sponsored or did any business ventures, but was perfectly fine money-wise somehow.
(For the Americans, think gangs that also do festival gigs)
"Yes, mom."
....
Miwa took a moment to look at her sword. As per request, it had been brought to her should she be called to a mission.
The others had left by now, with momo sweeping Mai off her feet and taking her and the zenin god-doesn't-want-to-know-where to do god-doesn't-want-to-know-what. Kamo had cited training as his reason for leaving, although Miwa has a suspicion it was to give muta and her alone time.
Not that she minded, as she had a small crush on him, though it didn't seem to have mattered too much when he was decidedly not interested in her, or at least so she thought. Could never tell when trying to romance a cyborg.
