The Problems of Working with Jackal

Problem One

"Rin, Rin," a slightly irritated voice continued calling her name but the addressed ignored it.

"I-I do not want to discuss this, Masamune." Kazehaya Rin said in a rush as she stormed through the hallways in an attempt to evade her one-eyed stalker. He continued to follow her, like she knew he would. She was glad that they were the only ones around at the time.

It was her free period and she was buying snacks at Sanada Yukimura and Sarutobi Sasuke's request when Date Masamune somehow saw her. He must have been cutting class again when he spotted her. She tried avoiding him but he wouldn't let her get away; not this time.

Rin went down the next hall to try and lose him but to her dismay, she ended up at a dead end. Shit.

She turned to go a different route but suddenly he had trapped her against the wall and she gulped. He wasn't angry per say, but he definitely wasn't too amused at the moment. He sighed and informed her crossly, "You've been avoiding me again, you know."

"N-no I haven't," Rin lied and ducking under his arms. "You're just catching me at bad times."

"Rin," Date said in exasperation and grabbed her wrist roughly to pull her back.

It was times like these, Rin reflected briefly, when her hatred for Masamune somehow renewed itself. He'd always been a touchy-feely kind of guy, but he usually kept it at a maximum of surprise hugs and butterfly kisses since they started dating… But when he was really feeling passionate, it was as if his testosterone levels went beyond female capabilities and his reasoning went out the window.

It was then, that Rin found it hardest to resist him, and it always came at some point every week. It was like Masamune's period, but it came more frequently than a girl's and instead of becoming an irritable female he became a sex-crazed pervert.

He pushed her against the wall again and pressed against her to make sure she couldn't escape. Just being this close made her dizzy and her head spun. She swallowed and forced out nervously, "What?"

"You know 'what'," he insisted, his blue-grey eye boring into her coal black ones.

"No, I don't," she flicked her eyes away.

He smirked now and asked with mock consideration, "Then would you like me to repeat myself?" He had moved his hand to her chin and traced along her bare neck to her shoulder, which he then slid along her arm to rest at her elbow.

Rin's face turned about twenty different shades of red then upon remembering his request, no, demand, before she stammered out, "N-no!"

"Why not? You seem to have difficulty recalling…" the hand at her elbow moved to her waist and he rubbed his thumb slightly again. He moved so his face was closer to hers and he kissed her temple gently.

Rin shuddered slightly before trying to pull out of his kissing range. She glared then as she looked around to make sure no one else was around before hissing out, "Masamune, you blatantly told me, 'I want to have sex' before practically raping me on the-"

Date laughed loudly and reasoned, "That's a total exaggeration. I was not going to rape you, you dork. I wasn't even two feet near you at the time."

"That's what made it even worse!" Rin practically screeched, "That you said it so… So…! So barefaced when I was working my waitress job! Who knows who heard you?!"

Masamune suddenly smirked with self-satisfaction, "Well, I thought it was pretty funny…" Not only had Rin dropped the tray of drinks she was holding, but her face had turned redder than Sanada Yukimura's headband, and nothing quite looked lovelier than an angry Rin but a furious Rin. He wished he had taken a picture.

"Well I didn't!" Rin suddenly shouted, "You could have gotten me in trouble! Or worse, fired!"

"They wouldn't fire you," Masamune said earnestly, "You work too hard, so they wouldn't want to lose you, even at the cost of a few cups."

She glared, "Why, you. That's nothing to joke about."

He gripped her chin and then said, "But I wasn't joking, I was being completely serious."

"And I'm being completely serious when I tell you, 'no'," Rin scowled as they stared at each other in a silent battle of authority.

He loosed the pressure on her body and sighed painfully, "You're killing me, I hope you know. Forcing a grown young man to go through abstinence-"

Rin slapped her hands over his mouth and she said in a threatening tone, "Masamune…"

She could feel him smirk against her palms before pulling away and asking innocently, "Yes, honey?"

"Are you insulting me now?" Rin frowned and he shrugged. She always found it amusing when he decided to switch into his foreign language, but honestly, she usually had no idea what he was saying.

"Not at all."

She sighed as she finally managed to get away from him and called back, "We may be dating Masamune, but that does not make me any more obligated to sleep with you than when we weren't."

He sighed with mock distress and called back, "Cruel."

"You'll survive," she said resolutely.

"Now. let's see…" Rin murmured to herself later that afternoon. This afternoon she was working at the antique store across from the cafe she worked at. She'd only been working here since her summer vacation, but already, it felt like a second home to her. Mouri Kanon was not the most considerate of bosses, but Rin had learned to accept her eccentric ways.

She studied the worn cover of an old book and turned it on its side to see the front. She dug into a drawer beside her and muttered, "Tape… Tape… I think if I tape it, it'll be-"

She jumped in her skin as a loud crash resounded from a few rooms back and Mouri Kanon's loud voice screeched, "Bontenmaru, you little shit! You get your ass back here!"

A blue streak raced into the room and towards the door, throwing it open and slamming it shut again before it threw itself over the counter. It hissed, "Rin, hide me!"

"What are you-?" Rin barely had time to get one word out as Masamune covered her mouth with his hand and pulled her behind the desk. Her heart began beating fast as she was pressed against him and she was afraid he'd hear it because it seemed so loud. As excited as she felt, she glared at him. He ignored her just as Kanon came into the room.

"Damn it," she muttered to herself.

Masamune peeked over the counter just as she rushed to the door. She opened it and shouted, "Yeah, you'd better run, you one-eyed brat! Next time I see you, you're so dead!" She huffed loudly and closed the door violently before retreating back to the room she had come from.

After a few minutes of silence he finally loosed his grip and Rin managed to tear herself free to demanded, "So, what did you do this time?"

He sighed and practically moaned, "I stepped on one of her puppets and the arm broke off!"

"That's it?" Rin asked innocently.

"'That's it'?" Date repeated incredulously. "That's like saying, 'that's it' after the nuclear bomb struck during World War II!"

Rin blinked, "What do you mean?"

Date looked away and brushed a hand through his hair distractedly, "I've gotten in trouble from doing even more trivial of things, but breaking and chipping her little toys pretty much earns you a one-way ticket to Hell. I mean, do you even know what happened when I was eight?"

"What?"

"I accidentally ate her Pocky! And do you know what happened?"

"No…"

"World War III." Masamune shuddered at the memory. "I was eight! Eight. And did I receive any mercy? No! I've been scarred for life because of her!"

Rin suddenly laughed unsympathetically, "You poor, poor thing."

"It's not funny!" he exclaimed. "I mean, she never rages at her own brother like she does to me; what am I? Some sort of pin cushion for her?!"

Rin laughed even harder, "You know, maybe that's just her way of showing affection." He raised an eyebrow at her and she continued, "Sometimes, the more energy one puts into something, the more regard one has for it, even if it may not seem that way."

Suddenly she bit her lip and she hoped he wouldn't take her words and apply them to her, as she just realized that seemed to be very applicable to her own situation.

Luckily, he didn't and only muttered, "Heh, funny way of showing it."

She patted his head teasingly, "You'll survive." Suddenly she remembered that they were hiding behind the counter together and her face flushed. She tried standing up abruptly but yelped and sat back down on her heel when she had bumped the back of her head on the edge of the desk.

She moaned as she cradled the back of her head, "Che!"

Masamune watched her with amusement and remarked offhandedly, "That looked like it hurt."

Rin glared as tears welled in the corners of her eyes, "You think?!" He laughed and mimicked her unsympathetic head pat.

"You'll survive," was all he said. He left his hand in her hair and she flushed again. Suddenly though, a little flash caught his eye and he moved it to stroke the hair pin near her right ear. A golden hairpin in the shape of a fan was slightly covered by her comb-like bangs but he brushed them away to see it more clearly. He blinked and asked slowly, "Isn't this the hairpin I bought you the night of the festival?"

Her eyes widened in surprise as she blushed as she brushed his hand away, "Y-yeah, what of it?"

He shrugged and stood up with a laugh. He offered a hand to her and teased, "Nothing. I just didn't know you liked it so much."

"W-well…" she looked away, unable to think of an excuse. She took his hand and stood up quickly, saying simply, "I didn't want your money to go to waste, that's all, so don't get such a fat head over it."

"Hm…" he only smirked, "Whatever you say."

Rin turned her back to him and he leaned on the front desk, watching as she busied herself looking for tape again. Aware that he was watching her every movement, she asked, "Shouldn't you be running as far as you can from here? After all, Kanon-sama did sound about ready to kill you."

He shrugged, "She'll get over it. True, she may sneak some sort of hot sauce into my next drink or hide my clothes after my bath tonight, but she'll cool off sooner or later. She gets angry over the stupidest of things but it usually doesn't last long."

Rin rolled her eyes as she tried keeping the sudden daydreams of Date out of her head. "O-oh…" was all she decided to say. He flipped through some papers on Kanon's desk listlessly as she tried taping the spine of the book. They did their own things in a companionable silence…

Now… Rin thought, at times like these, he could be so gentle and she understood why she liked this guy so much… When he wasn't being a suggestive pervert, he was quite kind and just his mere aura gave her a sense of ease.

She looked at him from the corner of her eyes and jumped when it met his single one. He grinned as her face heated up.

"Need something?" he teased.

"N-no, not at all!" she claimed.

He moved to stand behind her and then pulled her close, "Is that so?"

"Of course! Now, let me go, you jerk!" She struggled but he only held her tighter.

"You know," he commented casually, "This reminds me of the night before my seventeenth birthday, remember? You pledged your ever-lasting love to me." He mimicked a sort of swoon and batted an eye in what was supposed to be mock seduction.

Rin bit her tongue harshly to stop from laughing and used that energy to shout furiously, "I did not! At least, not like that!"

"Oh?" he taunted, "But you did admit that you loved me for the first time, didn't you?"

"W-well… Yeah... I did… Because… I do…So…" Rin glared weakly as her voice trailed off. She finally huffed and looked away, "You're such a jerk."

He grinned. "By the way, about that request from earlier," he murmured as he kissed her.

Rin glared as she pulled away, "The answer is still 'no'."

He shrugged, "Thought I might as well try." She rolled her eyes. He smiled and patted her head childishly.

Rin blushed furiously as she suddenly forced out reluctantly, "I… love you, Masamune."

He grinned as he leaned in to kiss her again, "I know, Rin."

It was then that Rin could truly say she loved that kid. No matter how touchy he got, she wanted to stay by his side because one day she knew she'd have the courage to bear his attention completely. She wanted to be by his side forever...

"But seriously," she broke away from him; trying not to smile. "I need to work now, so leave me alone."

He shrugged, "Whatever you-"

"Ah, there you are, you one-eyed brat." Masamune froze as he turned to face the familiar, dangerously low voice. A scary sort of black aura seemed to encircle Kanon and although she seemed to be smiling, there was a sort of edge behind it. She laughed in a sinister way and said with mock friendliness, "You have exactly three seconds to start running."

It barely took him one.

Suddenly, he had streaked away again out of the shop as Kanon raced after him. He shouted, "Later, Rin!"

"Wait, you brat!" Kanon shouted, "I'm not through with you yet!"

Rin sighed as she waved wearily; just another day of working under Kanon. Crazy, wild, and unpredictable was what she was, but never boring. Even so, Rin didn't mind, and with the chance at being by Masamune's side, she could tolerate it.

Yes… It was truly the life she loved to live. As problematic as it may be.

That was the problem with working under Jackal.

You could never predict what she'd plan next.

A/N: This is mostly stuff I wrote before I got into the main plot of the series The Problem with Smart Girls and I wanted to keep it, but with its addition it was just way too much writing so: I created a new series. They're going to be relatively short and probably not in chronological order as I am creating side stories that occur while Rin is working for Kanon - since, seriously, there's just no room for these stories in the original series.

The chapters will be known as "problems".

It will most likely be fluff.

Just cuz' the real story occurs during The Problem with Smart Girls, these ones will not bear much weight in comparison. We will see how this will build.

- Jackal

(Rin's thought about Masamune kind of seem like they bounce back and forth between love and hate because I wrote most of this before the events in the other story occurred and it was a little difficult to get back into that mode. I don't know, I might end up scrapping this chapter entirely.)