Chapter 1: Welcome to the 20th Ward

++ Sen Hotaru's POV++

I was walking along a busy street of the Nerima Ward, commonly known as the 20th Ward, in Tokyo. My unusually red trench coat and red sunglasses attracted the attention of almost every pedestrian I passed. They stared at me with their curious and judging eyes, never knowing about the danger I represented.

A predator among prey, that was what I was.

With relaxed steps I continued to make my way towards my destination. It wasn't far away anymore, just a few meters.

Anteiku was a small cafe at the end of the street. From the outside it looked like every other cafe in Tokyo, but it was the inside that mattered. At least, that's what the few girls I had asked for a recommendation earlier told me.

The smell of coffee assaulted my senses when I finally entered the small building. Once again my unique attire and appearance lured the people's gazes to me. There were no customers in the building only staff members, not unusual for that time of night. Being already used to it, I managed to ignore them. I had long since ceased to care about such trivial things.

Slowly, my feet transported me to one of the free tables. I settled down on a comfortable looking chair and looked at the small menu card before me.

"Hello," a waitress walked up to me, "I'm Mayumi and I'll be your waitress this evening." She had a shy, whispery voice.

"Nice to meet you," I said, "I'd love some light coffee."

"Okay," she scribbled in her notepad, "one cup of light coffee."

"Thank you," I said.

When she went behind the counter, a man wearing a porcelain doll mask entered through the front door. And then he drew a gun and pointed it at a blue haired girl at the counter. He said, "Give me all of the money!" The staff were visibly afraid, but probably not as much as they should have, and I found it odd.

I stood up, saying, "Leave now while you're still standing."

He said nothing, he just turned around quickly and hit me to the ground and turned back around to face the blue haired girl. I stood back up and tapped his shoulder.

He turned around and I punched him square in the face, shattering his porcelain mask, revealing the face of a ghoul.

I smiled evilly, "You've just made my day," I stated before he punched me in the face, knocking off my glasses. I stood back up and stared at him.

He took a step back in shock, "You're one of us? Why is only one of your eyes red."

I punched him in the stomach and again him in the face, he was unconscious before he hit the ground. "It's complicated," I stated picking up my glasses. "Sorry about the mess, I'll be on my way now." I left six hundred yen on the table and left, leaving a stunned staff behind.

++The Next Morning++

++Mayumi Kurogi's POV++

"Wait, WHAT?!" I yelled at the manager, Yoshimura. "You can't be serious!"

"Yes, Mayumi, I am. I want you to follow that man in the red coat," he emphasized his statement again as he was sitting relaxed in his chair. "He's a one eyed ghoul," he said that as if he still wasn't so sure that he believed it, even after what he'd seen the other day.

"Why is that so hard to believe?" I asked. He just stared back at me cryptically. I knew it wasn't wise to second-guess or question Yoshimura, especially since he was always more bent on peace than on war. I could not help wondering what the big deal was. It seemed like there was more going on than he was letting on.

"Just follow him, please," he said. "We need to be aware of his every movement."

"Yeah, THAT wasn't weird," I thought sarcastically. "But sir," I said, using a much more polite and respectful tone than the one in my head, "I've never been out in the field. I haven't made it that far into my training. I have no idea what to do."

"Touka has shown you all that you need to know. Simply follow what she's already taught you, but apply it to the real world." I still wondered why he was sending me.

He seemed to understand my inner doubts. He got that parental look in his eyes. "We all must do our part," he said. "Touka has obligations here. You're the only one available to do this. Follow him without being seen," he added; "but be careful. You saw what he did to that porcelain ghoul earlier. If you get too close and he realizes what you are, he might kill you."

"That's a pretty big 'if'," I said.

"You'll do fine," he smiled. "Remember who it was who taught you. You've learned from the best."

I could not argue with that; she taught me how to use stealth, learn to control my instincts, how to fight, and how to control my kagune. She did not like me very much, but she was a damn good teacher. I smiled back. "Fine. I'll wear my octopus mask. But if I die, I want a really NICE funeral. I mean it. Break the bank." He chuckled low under his breath as I walked away.

++Later++

From the shadows, I followed the man in the red coat. He looked like a shady character, but he acted like a nice guy. After a few minutes of walking, he walked into a dark alley, where a human man was assaulting a human woman. The woman had been hit on the head and knocked unconscious, before the human could react, the man in the red coat ran at him and punched him hard in the gut, knocking him to the ground. The man in the red coat picked her up bridal style and carried her to the nearest hospital. I continued to follow him, he really seemed like a nice guy. It was when he left the hospital when things took a turn.

"Hey," a ghoul said as he walked up to the man in the red coat, it was the porcelain ghoul who tried to rob Anteiku.

"I knew that you come back," the man in the red coat said, "they always do."

"You wish," the ghoul said activating his kagune. It was a koukaku that wrapped around his right arm and formed a trident. With one swift movement, he thrust the trident through his chest and into the wall behind him. I gasped as the man in the red coat coughed up blood, and then laughed.

He drew a pistol and pointed it at the ghoul. There was a loud bang, and both of them dropped. After a few seconds of silence, the man in the red coat started laughing.

He began to weakly stand up, "Thank you CCG for letting me 'barrow' one of your pistols." He walked up to the body, shoved his fist deep into the ghoul's chest, and tore out his heart and threw it to the side.

He stood up again, leaned up against the hospital as he walked, and began walking against the wall and walked into the alley, smearing blood as he went.

I followed him until he fell onto his hands and knees. "I could really use something to eat right now. I'm not used to seeing this much of my own blood anymore."

He turned around and saw me. He fell to his back and drew his gun, and then he dropped it, "You're lucky that I have holes in my chest, otherwise I'd kill you."

Without saying a word, I walked over to him. "So," he said "what do you call yourself? Octopus? Squid? Cthulhu?"

I realized that he must have been talking about my mask. I wore a mask whose tentacles draped down the sides of my face, leaving my mouth exposed. The ridged forehead and rusted metallic tint gave my mask an ominous, thug-like appearance to it. But that was a good thing. It kept people from sticking their noses into my business. I knew some ghoul women who preferred 'cute' masks to scary ones. I never understood that logic myself.

"Octopus," I answered.

"Under normal circumstances," he said "a ghoul would finish me off right now, why aren't you?"

I shrugged, "It's a personal policy of mine not to kill people, least of all other "

He coughed up blood again, "I need to eat something."

I reached into my bag and gave him some wrapped up meat, "I can give you this."

He removed his glasses, grabbed it and ate it like he had not eaten in months. I looked down and noticed the three holes in his chest stopped bleeding, but were not sealed. I saw his eyes, his left eye was human, but his right eye was red. It confirmed what Yoshimura told me: he was a one eyed ghoul.

"I guess I owe you one now," he sat up and put on his glasses, "at least my bleeding stopped."

He spotted something at the end of the alley, I turned around and saw a man wearing a white dress shirt, light dress pants, and black dress shoes. He was crouched next to the body of the ghoul that the one eyed ghoul had recently killed. He turned toward us, and I noticed that he was wearing a dark red necktie and a grey trench coat, adorned with shiny, silver accents. He carried a silver briefcase in his hand, and there was a pistol holster in his right hip. He was a CCG investigator, a Dove. I almost panicked, but I kept my cool. We needed to escape, and I knew how.

There was a distinctive slithering beneath my shirt as my kagune came forth. The emergence of my rinkaku kagune may have looked odd and seem practiced, the way that the kagune slithered slowly down my back and out the bottom of my shirt without violently tearing apart my clothing, even in a desperate situation like this. The one eyed ghoul probably wondered how often I had practiced the modest behavior before finally mastering it. It proved one thing very clearly: I had exceptional control. Out of the small of my back came four red tentacles about six meters long each, and each of those had three tentacles that separated at the tip and were three quarters of a meter long each.

The Dove dropped the briefcase and drew his pistol, but he hesitated. I began to look for an escape route.

Like many ghouls, I was a powerful jumper. But despite that, the one eyed ghoul was an adult male and would not be easy to carry. Even still, in my desperation I managed to support him with one of my kagune. I used my powerful legs and the remainder of my kagune to scale a nearby fire escape. I took it as quickly as I could, level by level, while the one eyed ghoul and I both were being fired at by the CCG investigator. Filled with disdain and determination, I hissed between my teeth when a bullet grazed one of my shoulders, and rolled both the one eyed ghoul and me onto the roof as the CCG investigator also began scaling the fire escape. Knowing it wouldn't be long before he'd catch up with us, despite the strain I was feeling, I picked up the one eyed ghoul and continued on toward the next roof.

By the time we were on the next roof, the Dove was on the roof behind us. The man was not such a bad shot, which boded ill for the one eyed ghoul and me. I found myself deflecting bullets with my kagune, though it took concentration that I didn't always have. Yet still, somehow, we managed to stay alive - and that was the important thing. We ran for almost thirty minutes before we jumped back into the alleys.

"This is my stop," he said casually.

"What?" I asked in disbelief. I flinched when I thought I heard the Dove's footsteps in the distance, but I knew in reality that it would take the man several minutes to get through the building and onto the ground level where we were standing.

"We have the perfect opportunity now to part ways here. It will be harder on him if we split up," he explained casually and winced in pain.

"But you're injured," I protested. "You can come with me. I know people who can help you-"

"We're both injured," he pointed out with a scoff. "Besides, you probably have... places to see, people to eat..."

"You're impossible," I growled.

"We don't have much time," he paused. "But..."

"But what?" I asked.

"I didn't mean that like it sounded," he admitted. "Thank you for saving my life. I don't like ghouls, but you're… different." I stood for a moment, dumbfounded, as he seemed to find his strength and began to disappear off in the opposite direction.

"Wait!" He didn't stop though. Even still, I found myself calling after him: "I didn't catch your name!"

It may have been a figment of my imagination, but just for a moment, I could have sworn he turned to me and said quietly over his shoulder: "Sen."

Hesitating only moments longer, I ran in the direction of Yoshimura and my other companions.

This is an experiment; I want to see if people like this story before I continue it.