Summary: Set shortly after ROK final episode. Anna ventured alone to Sceptre 4 Headquarter to talk to Munakata about filing away her registry reports as a King. Anna insisted that Kusanagi not accompany her, but found herself under the reluctant 'guidance' of one former Red Clansman once she set foot on Sceptre 4 grounds. Anna's point of view, or mostly.

Characters: KUSHINA Anna, FUSHIMI Saruhiko, MUNAKATA Reishi

Character shipping: subject to interpretation :p

Disclaimer: I do not own, you will not sue; the K project and its characters belong to the GoRA group.

The Reluctant Chaperone

In the aftermath of the Yomito* Incident, known esoterically as The Destroying of the Dresden Slate, the employees of Sceptre 4 found themselves inundated with workload of an unprecedented magnitude.

Said work mostly revolved around restoring order within the government, resettling captured Green lower rankers who without their special power were mere delinquents, and of course, endless drafting of endless reports.

To make matters worse, each report had to be prepared in two versions. Version One was to be distributed among ordinary police members and government officials to whom the influence of the Slate had to remain a secret, and as such the wording had to be carefully versed. Version Two was more straightforward and was to be filed away at Sceptre 4's own Records Office and also fax'ed to the Gold Clan at Nanakamato, which after all the havoc still remained the political centre of this country.

Blissfully oblivious to all of this, Anna pushed open the gate at the Sceptre 4 Headquarter and walked in.

She had known for some time that an appointment was due. An appointment between the former Red King and the former Blue King, post-Slate fashion. Anna liked to refer to all the events before the Yomito Incident as pre-Slate, and everything after as post-Slate. The Slate and its very influence had haunted her for as long as she could remember, and even now, as things began to settle and return to normal, the memory of its influence still lingered, an echo of the past laced with struggle and something akin to nostalgia.

'I come to this place as "the former Red King". But I wish you had called me by my first name and treated me like an ordinary person, Reishi,' Anna muttered to herself, both feet firmly on the ground and within the Blue territory. There was no alarm bell, just like last time when she sneaked in in the dead of night to feed the Strain horse. Anna walked across the front yard until her feet reached the colossal double-panelled door of the building itself, and paused there, not sure whether to open said door or wait outside. Then came footsteps from the other side of the building. Someone was walking toward her but yet to notice her presence.

Anna turned in the direction where the person was bound to emerge.

'Saruhiko?'

The person just turned around the corner and froze at Anna's voice. The two of them had met like this before, albeit in the stable and at night, and pre-Slate.

Fushimi's eyes fell on Anna and widened like those of a child caught off guard. 'Wh-what are you doing here?'

'You put on the same face when you caught me feeding Basashi**, Saruhiko.'

The genuine astonishment on Fushimi's face vanished as swiftly as it had appeared. He now looked like his usual self, composed and rather cynical.

'Are you here to see the Captain?'

Anna nodded. 'Only Reishi didn't tell me when, so I just came as I did.'

Fushimi went in, but held the door open without looking back at Anna.

'Better be quick if you want to come in. I haven't got all day.'

Anna slipped in under Fushimi's outstretched arm. 'Thank you, Saruhiko.'

Fushimi clicked his tongue. 'Have you been here before?'

'If you mean inside this building, no,' Anna looked around. The front hall reminded her of some kind of cathedral, or the dreamt-of place where she sensed Mikoto's presence and tried desperately to catch hold of him.

'The Captain's Office's upstairs.'

Anna turned around to find Fushimi walking away, obviously not keen on taking her where she wanted to go.

Anna was greeted with 'what a pleasant surprise to see you here' when she entered the Captain's Office without knocking, except that the occupant of the room did not sound remotely surprised.

'We are not used to knocking on people's doors at Bar Homura,' Anna said, closing the door before turning to face the man behind the desk, who regarded her with a quietly amused eye.

'It does not matter. I take it that you came here alone?'

'I told Izumo not to accompany me.'

Munakata stood up. 'My apologies for not going downstairs to greet you. I was expecting a phone call from Mr Kusanagi that might inform me of your arrival beforehand.'

Anna approached the desk. Blue King or not, Munakata was head of a special police force organisation. The sheer aura of formality around his whole being was just as innate to him as the fettered apocalypse she had sensed deep within Mikoto.

'You mentioned something about re-registering former Kings, Reishi.'

'Yes, and re-classifying Superpower wielders of all grades. Now that the Slate is gone, we need an entirely new filing and records system,' Munakata nodded, inviting Anna to the tearoom corner. 'For the moment, Red and Blue are the only Kings that remain. It is more efficient to start with these two, namely you and myself.'

'You forgot about Yashiro.'

Munakata smiled, 'I said "for the moment." One of my subordinates has some paperwork to sort through before we start. If you will excuse me.'

Anna watched Munakata handle the delicate teacups with his fair, tapered fingers.

'But, Reishi-'

A knock on the door cut her off. Munakata looked up.

'Come in.'

The door opened to reveal none other than the person Anna just ran into moments before, clutching a tablet PDA and a stack of paper. Fushimi glanced at Anna, then rested his eyes on Munakata, who had already resumed making tea.

'The Red King's Status Registry Report Version Two, sir,' Fushimi tapped the tablet screen, and a holograph emerged, displaying the electronic copy of the printed report. Some lingering part of Anna's sensory instinct told her the reason Fushimi did that was to avoid coming onto the tatami mattress and handing over the actual report to his boss.

'Thank you.'

Anna read the holograph. Most of them were big words that she found hard to understand, but she did catch certain familiar phrases like 'Superpower wielders' 'King's Sanctum' and 'Weismann Level'… it was quite a long report as well. Anna found it incredible that Fushimi had prepared the whole thing by himself; but again, it seemed the sort of thing Fushimi excelled at (if not enjoyed) doing, right since his days at Homra.

'Well done, Fushimi. That was quite comprehensive.'

Anna saw Fushimi's sapphire blue eyes darting toward Munakata's face for the briefest moment before returning to the printed report in his hand.

'... Cheers.'

'What do you think?'

Anna could tell what Munakata wanted. 'I don't know much about this kind of thing, but I'll sign it if it helps.'

'This is the report on the condition of your Power and influence as the Red King,' Munakata began in an explanatory tone; Fushimi held his mouth slightly askew as if the very sound of Munakata's voice gave him toothache. 'With the Dresden Slate gone and its influence diminishing, it can be safely assumed that the Red King's destructive power would never cross the threshold again. You will be re-classified as a former ex-alpha subject and a safe Superpower wielder. And you will no longer be regarded as a King.'

Anna looked down at her folded hands. 'I got that much from the holograph. It's all I needed to know, that is…'

Munakata watched her, waiting for her to continue. 'Which is?'

'…that I've destroyed the fate of being a Red King, using its own power of destruction.' Anna glanced up, catching Munakata's eye. 'It's all gone now. Things are safer. Everyone is safer. And that's that. That's really all that matters.'

Munakata only smiled his polite smile, although the look he gave Anna was filled with quiet affection.

'If you would be so kind, Fushimi.'

Fushimi sighed softly and came forward, handing over the stack of paper to Anna, who sat at the very edge of the tatami mattress and thus saved him the trouble of venturing further.

'Please sign here. And here.'

Anna finished signing, and came off the tatami. 'I'll get going now. Izumo wouldn't be very happy if I stayed too long.'

'Shall I walk you to the front gate?'

'No, thanks,' Anna stepped into her shoes and straightened up. 'You seem to be doing well, Reishi. And you, Saruhiko.'

Munakata smiled. Fushimi clicked his tongue, putting the signed document together.

'Would you like to walk the former Red King to the front gate, Fushimi?'

Fushimi looked at Munakata over Anna's head.

'Since when did I get landed with things like escorting people-?'

'Saruhiko,'

Fushimi lowered his eyes and was confronted with Anna's upturned and unguarded face.

'You don't have to if you don't want to, Saruhiko. I can manage on my own. I'll try not to get lost.'

Fushimi sighed again, even more softly.

'Come this way.'

-FIN-

*: Mentioned in ROK episode 11 and presumably the area of Tokyo where the Green Clan's secret base is located.

**: The Strain horse in the Memory of Red manga for those who haven't read it. Anna brought the horse to Bar Homura and Mikoto named it Basashi (literally raw horse meat sashimi). Basashi later returned to Sceptre 4 and was renamed White Bean Paste Tofu Stew by Awashima.

A/N: Since my last post (a Fushimi/Yata one-shot) I've been buying and reading as many K novels as I can. I'm slow to this fandom but have literally sunk rather deep after 2 years. The thing with reading too much Japanese is that I find it hard to write fanfics in English! The nuances and subtleties are just plain hard to convey, but I guess I managed to capture the characters' speaking styles the way they sound to me in the original. One thought: nobody beats Munakata in terms of conversational elegance (read: rigidity)! Maybe Yukari does when he's in a haiku-reciting mood but…

Update: I'm happy that people are enjoying this but I forgot to mention that it's a one shot only... so no more chapters coming. I'm working on a longer story that focuses on Fushimi as he joins the Intel Division at Scepter 4 (so basically it's the same as Days of Blue manga time-wise) to see if I can actually survive writing a long story :)