Hei watched from the shadows as the contractor who was his latest target gave a cursory glance around the area before entering the building in front of him. Silent as the shadows around him, Hei followed, keeping the man in his sight along with all of his surroundings.
The man in front of him was dressed in black; a standard thug's uniform, wearing a black hat along with an idiotic yet ruthless expression on his face.
Disgusting, thought Hei. He had seen his share of contractors, and this kind was the one that he disliked the most. Just blindly doing what they are told, not even just for money, but for the pain they can inflict on others.
He watched the man as he climbed the seven flights of steps up the staircase to the roof, following behind unseen and unheard, just another shadow in the darkened building.
Reaching the roof, the man glanced around nervously, clearly waiting for a second person to complete his trade off mission with. That was the second person Hei was supposed to kill tonight.
Hei moved to the side of the building's roof, waiting for the second person to arrive before he struck at both in one swoop.
Suddenly, Hei heard a gun cock behind his back. Swearing in his mind, Hei froze, turning his head slightly and preparing his wire to attack and escape.
"BK-201," said the person behind him, a well toned man wearing a suit and his hair slicked back. "It seems that our plan to catch you has been successful," he said, sounding pleased with himself.
Suddenly cursing, the man turned around, and began to stretch out, in the whole routine of a yoga practitioner.
Seizing his advantage, Hei pulled himself away and back into the shadows using his wire. Immediately, the man was behind him again, smirking despite his recent yoga session that must be his obeisance.
"That's right, BK-201," said the contractor, "I can teleport. I may have an irritating obeisance, but I can catch up with you no matter where you go".
Hei remained emotionless under his Kuro no Shinigami mask, and disappeared into the shadows again, this time continuing to move, around and around the other contractor.
He jumped into sight, sending his knifes flying towards the other man, while keeping his wire ready to pull him out of the way of a new attack any second.
The teleporting contractor saw the knives a second too late and cried out in pain when they hit his leg, causing him to crumple to the ground. Hei sent a current along his line to the knife, ending the other man's cries.
Suddenly, a rush of pain hit his chest and his leg, sending a jerk of pain running along his own body. Gritting his teeth and limping, Hei turned to face the temporarily forgotten other contractor. His eyes were red, and his whole body was glowing blue. Hei narrowed his eyes, and sent two knifes flying at him, impaling the other man in the skull before electrocuting him.
Hei collapsed, clinging to his leg, which was covered in his blood and the other contractor's. Not only did it send tingles of pain up his entire body whenever he moved, the leg itself was losing feeling quickly. Each breath that he took hurt his chest, and he felt that he could barely move.
Resting a moment against the side of a small tower on the roof, Hei considered his options. Yin was working at a shop, trying to get some extra money for herself. She had found a place at an inn to stay at, and was talking care of herself well. Hei didn't want to go there and ruin whatever repast she had found from constantly fighting and running.
There was a place where Hei himself was staying, but he knew that the real thing he needed was medical attention, and he could hardly walk into a hospital, declare himself BK-201, and hope to escape alive and free.
There was one last place Hei could think of going where he might even be able to get some medical help and a place to rest, but the last words he had spoken to the person who lived there were "The person named Li no longer exists."
Hei, using the last of his strength, swung off the roof into the black night in search of the one place he could go for help.
Misaki walked home to her apartment from a tiring day at work. She had been working twelve hour shifts, finding and fighting contractors at least twice a day. They had so many attacks that there had been barely time to write up the report on what had happened before they had a new incident.
There was only one contractor she was interested in finding, but she hadn't had much luck with that so far. They had seen signs of BK-201's activity, but they always got there to late or were simply to busy with other contractors at the time.
Misaki knew that Li– Hei was still in Tokyo. That was the one piece of information that kept her focused.
She had become close friends with Li– Hei when she had known him only as an innocent exchange student, although she supposed now that it could have all been an act by him to get police information.
I still keep on mixing up his names too, thought Misaki. His name is Hei, not Li-kun.
Misaki had looked up the name Li Shengshun, and had found a record of a brother and sister, Li and Xing, who had been killed along with their parents when the boy was barely a teenager, if even that.
You chose this life at twelve years old, she thought. Hei, how did you even survive?
Entering her apartment building, Misaki walked up the two flights of stairs to her apartment, reminding herself of her friends' declarations that she would gain all of the weight she took in now when she turned thirty.
Entering her suite, Misaki walked to the kitchen and started to make herself some coffee.
Suddenly, a large clanging sound rang from her balcony. Misaki ran out to the ledge that overlooked Tokyo. Her breath caught, seeing a man wearing a ghostly white mask with thin red lips and a violet lightning bolt over one eye leaning against the railing of her balcony. Covered with specks of blood.
"Misaki," Hei whispered, and then trailed off. Misaki looked at him in shock, seeing his blood covered clothing.
"Sorry to visit like this, but do you think you could help me?" asked Hei faintly, with a touch of humor in his voice that reminded her of how he was as Li-kun.
As Misaki stared, frozen in shock, Hei collapsed to the floor, fainting, with a sigh, waking Misaki from her shock.
Tears starting to form in the corners of her eyes, Misaki hurried forward and dragged Hei into the warmth of her apartment. She leaned against the wall, and ran to grab the extra futon that she kept mostly unused for if one of her few friends decided to or needed to sleep over.
Laying it on the floor in the area between her kitchen and living room, she went to Hei and carried his limp weight over to the futon, lying him on it as gently as she could, thanking the minutes she had spent weight training to become one of the police in her mind.
As carefully as Misaki could, she pulled off his overcoat, throwing it to the side. Almost hesitantly, she pulled off his mask, a sudden intake of breath hissing at the sight of Li-kun's face behind the mask she had so often wanted to pull off.
Setting the mask to the side, Misaki pulled off Hei's shirt, wincing at the sight of the bruises and cuts on his chest. She ran to the kitchen and took a bowl of warm water and a black washcloth. Then, she found her first aid kit that she kept for emergencies in her closet, and moved back to Hei. Bending down, she carefully cleaned the blood off his chest, adding antiseptic to each cut. Feeling his chest, she could tell that one of his ribs was broken. She tried to not press hard over that area, but she felt Hei twitch with discomfort every time the cloth came close.
Misaki then tried to bandage his chest. Since he was asleep, and she didn't want to cause his rib more pain than it was surely already in, it took her nearly twenty minutes just to get the bandages around his ribs right.
Moving down to his legs, Misaki rolled up his right pant leg, the one that appeared to be covered in blood. It had two large but shallow cuts in it, and the bone appeared to be broken.
Shaking, Misaki cleaned off his leg and bandaged it. Checking Hei's forehead, she saw that he had a fever. Getting a wet, cold, washcloth, she laid it over his forehead.
Moving quickly, Misaki cleaned up her supplies and laid a quilt blanket over Hei. She sat on the couch beside Hei, and watched him, getting up every several minutes to change the cloth on his forehead.
Alone with her thoughts, Misaki watched Hei sleeping.
He looks so peaceful, she thought. You wouldn't expect him to be Kuro no Shinigami.
What am I supposed to do now? Misaki wondered. I have Kuro no Shinigami here with me now, weakened enough that I could arrest him and bring him in without a fight. It wasn't an opportunity she would have again, but somehow, Misaki just couldn't bring herself to betray him like that.
Caught in her troublesome thoughts, she watched Hei, his breathing in a more even rhythm than it had been when she had first brought him in. She checked his forehead again, and found that his fever had broken.
Nearly crying in her relief and fatigue, Misaki collapsed to the couch, lying down in as comfortable a position she could get in, and watched him until she fell asleep, remembering the time they spent together.