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The sun had peeked upon the horizon, painting the lands with its light as it slowly wiped the night’s darkness away. Bat got up, still on his side of the bed, and before he stood up to prepare himself, he gazed upon his little simple family of two: Lin and Hana. The young father and husband sighed out of the wave of warmth he felt in his heart, praising the existence of his precious two, woman and girl, with his own eyes. But he had to snap himself out of the fuzzy daydreaming so that he could get back to the base and plan on more liberation movements, now that he was the leader and the captain of the entire North Star force. The warrior put his armor on, then his boots that he held with knee pads. But before he headed to the door, he had to see his wife and kid one last time before the sunrise. He reached down to Lin to kiss her goodbye while trying to keep her and the baby asleep. Unfortunately for him, the bed frame creaked when he had held onto the edge of the mattress, which woke Lin up, and the facade of her husband was so close to hers that it scared the daylight -that just started- out of her. Lin shrieked, Bat shrieked back, which scared Hana awake. The toddler started crying.
“I’m Sorry!! I was just- Shit…” Bat explained anxiously. He turned around to his scared baby daughter, picked her up and gently laid her on his shoulder, patting her back to calm her down. “There, there… Your old man did an oopsie, okay?”
“What the HELL was all of that?” The young mother grumbled, rubbing her eyes with her forearm.
“I just wanted to let you know I’m heading out… I screwed up.” Disappointment appeared in Bat's eyes.
“Ugh, you could’ve simply just gone. Trust me, I know where you’d head off to.” Lin murmured, as she rolled back into the sheets.
“... Yeah, I gotta go. Should I just-” Bat pulled Hana off of his chest to put her back in her crib, but the baby was not having any of that, as she started fussing right when she was getting lowered to her tiny bed.
“Just give her here. Go to work, your men need you.” Lin waved her hand, shooing Bat.
“Okay… But I won’t leave ‘til I give you a souvenir~♪” Bat grinned.
“Hm?” Lin’s confusion was cleared right away with a kiss on the cheek as he handed her the five-month-old. She smiled and shook her head as her husband ran off to business. “Oh, wait. Bat! Did you have anything for breakf-” It was too late because he already stormed out. She gave her attention back to her little sweet flower as she started fussing again, she rocked her back to sleep, put her back in the crib and joined her in slumber, until the sun rose high enough to make the sky blue for another day.
A couple of hours passed until Lin dozed off by her baby’s cries, what could she possibly need right now? The young mother picked her up to check up on her needs. The diaper was still clean, sleep was no longer needed, yet she did not feel at ease. Suddenly, Hana pulled down on Lin’s dress by the neck and revealed some of her chest while whining.
“Ow! Quit it, young lady!” Lin grunted from the pain of the top of her right breast getting clawed by her infant daughter, that was when she realized that Hana only wanted breakfast.
“How could I forget?” Lin palmed her own face, walking down the stairs. “Now that I mentioned it, I gotta eat too.” Lin cradled Hana in one arm for her to latch, while using the other to grab something to eat as she navigated around the kitchen.
Meanwhile, Bat and his men were investigating the areas they have never come across yet. Everything was normal for Lin and Bat so far. Total peace was something that Lin always appreciated, but to Bat, that just made him more cautious because he believed it was too early and odd for such a world of ruins to just be peaceful out of the blue. However, it was discovered later that the whole situation was just the celestial army taking their responsibility as liberators. Although he was grateful, Bat felt like it was a burden that he gave to the celestial empire to carry, so he and his men went to the celestial empire to apologize and request alliance between the Source Star and the North Star with empress Lui.
The army reached the gateway, were let in and Bat went to the castle to meet the empress. He walked into the throne hall where he met his sister-in-law.
“Your highness.” He kneeled in respect.
“Bat!” Lui jumped off of her throne, running towards her brother-in-law with open arms, which confused Bat and even the guards around them.
“Woah! Your majesty, wait!” But it was too late, as he was already trapped between her arms. “Please tell me you brought her here, too!” Lui looked at Bat with excitement.
“Uhh, no… Sorry, this isn’t just a family visit.” Such a response disappointed Lui and turned her from being super cheerful to poker-faced and acting all professional.
“Oh… What could you possibly need?” Said Lui after walking back to her throne and sitting on it.
“I know we have discussed this before, but may our armies collide instead of just going around without us knowing? We could make it less time-wasting for the North Star army, and more beneficial to the country’s safety lifespan.”
“Listen…” Lui laid her forehead on her knuckles, “It is impossible for two forces to just…‘Collide’. Rather than that, we can be allies, we contact each other for needs, help and all that. Not to brag, but I feel like you guys are the ones to need help. Especially in weapon equipment.”
“Yeah…” Bat sighed.
“There’s no shame in needing help, though.” Lui shrugged. “I mean, you guys kinda started from nothing, especially since you were announced a captain on your own. I’m proud of how you still handled things and kept it all together.” Lui smiled.
“Well, your highness, I have to.” Bat looked up.
“Please, just call me by my name, we are family after all, yes?”
“I'm just trying to be professional, alright?” Bat looked at Lui with one eye.
“Just?” The two laughed it off, until Lui interrupted, “But yeah, we can only collaborate, we cannot merge our men and forces.”
“Got it! Thank you.” Bat bowed. “Though I wanna ask, can you guys inform us when to go out first from now on?”
“What? Did we steal your job?” Lui mocked.
“N-no! That wasn’t it! It’s just-”
“I’m just messing with you! But yes, we will find a way to inform you guys and we can even build a strategy on both of us setting liberation movements and even assure that the previously-liberated areas don’t get attacked again.”
Bat bowed, “Yes, your maj- Lui.” He looked up to his in-law with a grin, still bowing, which made Lui laugh. Bat laughed back, and the rest of the hall shared the laughter.
Two days have passed, and Bat and his men have finally made it home at night. He went up to the top story of the north star base, which was where he and Lin lived, and used to live with master Rihaku. He knocked on the door thrice and called: “Lin~ I’m home~”, Lin took a little longer than usual to reach the door and opened it.
“Bat.” She said in a tired yet excited tone.
“Hm? Oh… Did your rose bloom again?” Bat looked concerned.
“No, but I’m somehow tired.” Lin held her head tight.
“Say no more. Go rest, I’ll handle it.” The man carried his wife bridal-style and took her straight to their bedroom after closing the door from behind with one foot. He tucked her in and gave her a light massage on both sides of her head, arms then shoulders while she was laying in bed, more relaxed now.
“Oh, what about Hana?” Bat asked.
“She’s… asleep… Better leave her like that until… she wakes up by herself.”
“Ah, yeah!” Bat gasped, “Guess who said hi~ Your sis!”
Lin gasped, “Oh, why didn’t you take me there with you?”
“Need I remind you that I was in dangerous environments? I just got to her for some discussions.”
“Ah…. Nevermind.” She started to slowly fall asleep.
“So… Wanna hear what happened there?” Bat noticed that his wife was no longer listening, the room went calm as he stopped talking, the red haired man stared at his sleeping wife. He cracked a smile and let out a sigh, as he said: “That little brat sure drained her energy.” and as soon as he said that, Hana started weeping. “Speak of the devil…” Bat got up to her crib and started rocking it gently. The baby opened her eyes and gazed upon her daddy while being rocked, he noticed her stare so he stared back.
“Let’s not wake your mom, okay?” Bat whispered to his daughter. And once again, Hana slowly started weeping as soon as he said that.
“Oh, no. We are not doing that.” Said Bat, as he picked Hana up and laid her on his shoulder, gently tapping on her tiny back, hoping that would calm her down, then he stepped out of the room in case she cried so that she wouldn't scare Lin up.
Bat stopped patting Hana’s back to see whether she went back to sleep or just calmed down. He looked at her and couldn’t help but smile. That round plumpy face of hers and those little sparkly eyes were enough to make the man melt for her cuteness and hold back his cute aggression as much as possible. Bat picked her and placed her belly on his face to nub her and started calmly laughing, which tickled her so she smiled widely while violently grabbing his hair with her small chubby hands. The two kept at the wrestling until Bat heard some noise coming from Hana, he immediately recognized it and got repulsed about it. The baby saw the shrunken face her father made, and that made her so embarrassed that a cry started building up.
“Wait, why are you… Oh… It’s the face I just made, wasn’t it?” Bat said to his little precious flower, but she immediately started crying.
“Shhh… It’s okay, I’m sorry! Just… Please hush, Hana.” The father laid her on top of his forearm on her back and patted her belly to calm her down, but that just made it worse. Lin woke up, hearing the fuss from afar but she was surprised when she realized that she was the only one in the room. The young mother got up from her bed, feeling a little better yet a little concerned about her family’s whereabouts, just to find the two in the hall. Bat froze in his place, looking at Lin then Hana when she started crying again.
“What’re you doing out here?”
“Didn’t wanna disturb you… But once again, I messed up.”
“What do I do with you?” Lin sighed, “Give her here.”
“One more thing, I think she did the thing.” Whispered Bat, handing his baby to her mom.
“Oh, yeah? Well, ain’t it high time you learned to deal with it.” Lin gently pushed the toddler back to Bat’s arms.
“Oh, boy…” Bat shrunk his own face in disgust.
A few minutes later, Bat accomplished his mission helping Hana get rid of the nasty, after many gags and coughs.
“You’ll get used to it.” said Lin in smug.
“Please do not put me through this ever again.” Bat said in repulsion.
“Come on!” Lin giggled at her husband, “You see blood and guts daily. That terrifies you?”
“Oh, well… Point taken. I do gotta toughen up. These days won’t last forever.” Bat smiled back. Lin picked Hana up to put her to sleep after her dinner.
“You probably haven’t rested since yesterday’s dawn, huh?” Lin asked Bat, rocking her baby.
“Yeah, but I still got some fuel if ya catch my drift.”
“...” Lin thought for a while, “Nah, that’s enough for you today. Get some rest, will you?”
“Not without you~”
“Hehe… Wait… Oh, dear! I forgot about dinner!” The lady put her baby in the crib gently yet fast.
“I’ll pass this time, not so hungry… I mean, don’t wait for me.”
“I did eat earlier, but… are you sure you’ll sleep on an empty stomach tonight?”
“Eh… Not gonna die because of that.” Bat shrugged.
“Well… What now?” Lin broke the short silence.
“...Bed… Now… No more time to waste.” Bat raised his eyebrows, smirking at Lin, who answered with a light giggle: “Mhm~”
One minute in, and the two young parents are already snoring and drooling on their pillows, legs and arms all over each other. Until Hana woke both of them in the middle of the night, craving for their attention with her usual cries.
“Hnnngg… What now~?” Lin murmured.