A/N; Hello there!

This is officially the first time I have ever attempted to write fanfiction, so uh, there's that? Hopefully those of you who take the time to read it will like it, because I certainly enjoyed writing it. I appreciate any feedback or constructive criticism, as this is largely a way for me to try and improve my overall writing, but please, no needless hate, yeah?

Don't be a dick.

Also, fair warning, I swear quite a bit, and this is obvious in what I write. So if that isn't your thing, or you don't like it, tough shit. I won't censor myself.

Enjoy~!

Shamira wakes up to the blaring ring of a landline, and it's enough to send her tumbling out of her bed in fright. She hits the floor, hard, and lets loose a string of curses as pain blossoms across the back of her skull. Her Stand's response is instantaneous, manifesting in less than half a second and positioning itself over her small form, like a parent shields their child, and its wings flare out not unlike a threat display. Shamira groans as the ringing continues.

"Relax, Rose Watcher," she mutters, "It's just the stupid phone." Her Stand glances towards the shrill object, and Shamira can easily imagine the sour glare on its face, were it not for the helmet that concealed it. Rose Watcher dissipates after another ring echoes through the room, and Shamira scrambles across the floor and lunges for the phone. She yanks the receiver off the base and props it against her ear, rubbing her eye with a yawn. "Hello?" she mumbles as she glances through the window in front of her. The sun is just peaking over the horizon.

"Greetings, Shamira!"

She jerks in surprise, slamming her knee against the desk. "Sonofa"—she hisses, massaging her leg in a failing attempt to lessen the throbbing pain—"U-Uncle Muhammad, hey!"

"Are you alright? That sounded painful," he teases, a hint of mirth present in his deep, gravelly voice. She makes a mental note that he chose to speak in Egyptian Arabic instead of English, giving her the impression that this may be a bit of a hush-hush conversation.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," she grunts in response; it did feel kind of nice being able to talk to someone in her native tongue again. "What's up, is everything okay?" Shamira glances at the alarm clock on her dresser; 4:48 AM. "I wasn't expecting a call so early."

He sighs through the line, and her brow furrows in concern. "Things are… Not well. Do you remember Holy Kujo?"

"Joseph Joestar's daugher, right?"

"Yes. She is ill."

Shamira frowns. "That's unfortunate. What's wrong with her?"

"At the moment she is fevered and fatigued, but it will only worsen." Muhammad says grimly. "Shamira, we know the cause; it's Dio."

She stiffens instantly and a knot forms in the pit of her stomach.

"D-Dio?" She falters. "The last time we heard of him, he was in Cairo. What the hell is he doing in Japan?"

"He isn't in Japan," Muhammad says. "It's his Stand that has struck Holy with this illness. Because he has Jonathon's body, he has inexplicably linked himself with the Joestar bloodline, and as a direct result of his Stand's manifestation every member of the lineage has seemed to gain one. Joseph, you are aware of his Stand, yes?" Shamira hums in confirmation. She remembers how Joseph was both ecstatic and troubled when his Stand first appeared. Muhammad continues. "Sometime during this last month, his grandson, Jotaro, gained his too; it is incredibly powerful. Within the last three days however, the same has happened to Holy as well, but…"

"It's killing her, isn't it?" Shamira blurts out. It wasn't the first time she's heard of it happening.

"Regrettably so," Muhammad sighs.

"That's… that's horrible," Shamira murmurs. She has never met Holy, but she's known Joseph almost as long as her uncle has, so she can't imagine how helpless the old man must be feeling right now. "Thank you for calling and telling me, Uncle. I wish there was something I could do."

"There is, actually," he states. "This matter with Holy is dire; she is dying. She has fifty days left, maybe, before her Stand ultimately kills her. Joseph and Jotaro have both made it clear that they will not just stand by and watch. We believe we know Dio's location; he is in Aswan, and evidently he has not left Egypt since I last encountered him. We plan to find him, and kill him, in the hopes it will end this curse afflicting her."

Shamira is speechless. Kill Dio? He had stolen the body of Joseph's grandfather over a hundred years ago, and the bastard had been living in a coffin at the bottom of the ocean for that whole century. Yet when Muhammad had last seen him, the monster was in perfect condition. How did they expect to kill someone like that? She grits her teeth, her fist curling into a tight ball. And he was still in Egypt…

Shamira can see Rose Watcher manifest out of the corner of her eye as a response to her growing rage; it is a hushed sentinel, its six wings bristling from the same fury she felt. Its armor catches the first beams of sunlight that reach Hong Kong, and as they pour through the window the metal shines as something Shamira could only describe as seraphic.

"Are you going with them?" she demands. "Because if you are, I'm coming with."

Her uncle gives an exuberant chuckle. "I was hoping you would say that."

Of course the first flight out to Egypt wasn't until 11 AM the next day. Still though, Shamira supposes it was better that she arrive in Cairo after the Joestars rather than before, just as a safety precaution. The last thing she needs is to draw any unwanted attention.

At least it gives her time to get her shit together, and by that, it means she puts off packing until the very next day. This is mostly because she has a job as a waitress at a small restaurant down the street from her apartment, and she wants to inform the owner of her sudden departure. Well, that and she also wants to buy some more rolls of film for her Polaroid 600. That camera is her baby, and if she's going back to Egypt, even if it's just to help kill some vampiric douchebag, she plans on taking as many snazzy photos as she can along the way.

Currently she's darting back and forth through her apartment, in her pajamas, amassing a meager collection of the essentials that she shoves unceremoniously into her leather satchel. Shamira doesn't have much for clothing, so she only packs two extra shirts and tank-tops and one pair of pants, all of which are mostly identical to what she had decided to wear anyway. She tosses in a spare sports bras and some panties, because those are necessary, okay? along with three pairs of socks.

Shamira glances at the clock; 6:27. She has time to shower.

Her apartment is pretty small, barely 15 sqm, and it only has enough room to house the basics. In one corner is her bed, which is nestled by a wooden dresser; at the foot of the bed sits a desk, and on that is a mini-TV that has a permanent line in the middle and that annoying landline phone that doesn't even work half the time she ever used it. On the wall perpendicular to the bed and desk is the kitchen, which consisted of a small refrigerator, a kitchen sink and stove-top, one cupboard, and just enough counter space to prep a meal. Parallel to that is the bathroom, a cramped room that barely manages to fit a toilet, shower, and sink, let alone someone who needs to use it.

Shamira hates that bathroom. She needs to shower and brush her teeth though but she really hates that bathroom.

When the water finally warms and she steps in, she starts thinking about what they might encounter in Cairo. As she massages her scalp, lathering her hair with shampoo, she wonders how they would even fight Dio. He's a vampire, that much she knew, but it isn't like vampires are an everyday occurrence. If anyone but Joseph Joestar had told her that they were real, she would have laughed their ass right out the front door. And what about Dio's Stand? She doesn't know what to expect in that regard.

Joseph's Purple Hermit isn't built for combat, but at least Muhammad's Magician's Red can ruin someone's day. She doesn't have a clue about Joseph's grandson though, what's-his-name. Jotaro? Muhammad had said his Stand is powerful, and Muhammad doesn't exaggerate, but just how powerful is that exactly? Strong enough to break her Stand's defenses?

Doubt it, Shamira thinks as she rinses her hair and pours a glob of conditioner into her hand. Rose Watcher's armor is, as far as she knows, impenetrable. And not just Watcher's armor, but its wings too. It might not be a particularly fast or strong Stand, but if there is one thing Shamira will bet her soul on, it is that nothing can shatter its guard.

As she rinses her hair again and reaches for the body wash, she catches sight of the patches of pale white skin on her arm and squints at it. Shamira is the same ethnicity as her uncle, African Egyptian, but she also has vitiligo.

And she has mixed feelings about it. All throughout her life she jumped back and forth between loving and hating it. When she was a child, she adored the attention she got from it; a lot of people thought it was interesting and "weird," but at that age she never saw weird as a bad thing. When her father passed away though, her entire view of it changed, and suddenly she hated it and wanted it gone. It made her feel alienated, and because of the life she had a home, she strived for normality. It wasn't until she had been adopted by her uncle that she began to embrace it again, although it could still be a pain in the ass sometimes because it made it hard to avoid unwanted attention.

When the water pouring down the drain no longer carries soap with it, Shamira turns the water off and reaches for a towel before wrapping it around her body.

She steps towards the sink, and as she begins to brush her teeth, she catches her reflection in the mirror. Her skin is dark brown, her eyes small, deep set, and mahogany. Her cheekbones are high and her nose is wide; she has a soft jawline, a pointed chin, and full lips. The most prominent part of the vitiligo is on her face and neck. It's a thick, spotted band that runs horizontally across her face, and the spots that reach her scalp have caused the normally black hair to turn ashen blond. It wraps around her neck like a scarf, trailing down her sternum, shoulders, and upper back, and patches dotted her ribs. The majority of her hands and wrists have it too, but it speckled towards her elbows. Shamira stares at her reflection for a moment, narrows her eyes, then spits into the sink.

When she walks out of the bathroom and glances at the clock again, 20 minutes has passed, so she decides to make a quick breakfast. She switches the TV on to a local English news station and opens the fridge, only partially listening to the reports the anchorwoman goes through. As she grabs two eggs and places a pan on the lit burner, one of the reports catches her attention:

"Earlier this morning, at around 6 AM, a jumbo jet made an emergency landing 35 kilometers south of Hong Kong, near Lamma Island. Efforts are underway to rescue all passengers."

Shamira furrows her brow as she listens, cracking one of the eggs over the hot pan.

"The commercial airline had departed from Sendai, Japan[1], and was scheduled to arrive in Cairo, Egypt, later today, but the pilots were incapacitated by an unknown assailant. A passenger was forced to make the emergency landing. Seven casualties have been reported, including the pilots, and…"

Shamira flinches, crushing the second egg in her hand on reflex, and turns to the little screen in shock. A flight from Japan to Egypt? That couldn't have been the same plane her uncle and the Joestars were on… could it? She glances at the mixture of yolk and egg whites that ooze from her clenched fist, and suddenly she remembers a moment in the past when Joseph had told her how he survived two plane crashes during his life. Shamira scowls at the trepidation that writhes in her gut, and as she washes her hands she tries not to think about the possibility her uncle or one of the Joestars could have been a casualty. That this had happened so soon, right after finding out that Dio was responsible for Holy's illness… It couldn't be a coincidence.

What was she going to do if the passengers who died were them though? What can she even do? Is she the only one besides them who knew about Dio? No, that can't be possible; Joseph would have informed the Speedwagon Foundation. But despite the incredible technology they have, it isn't like they have an abundance of Stand Users they can throw around willy-nilly. Still though… What about Holy? Who was going to stop Dio? Was Shamira going to have to do it alone?

A shrill ring echoes through the apartment, and Shamira winces as it drags her from her bleak thoughts. She dries her hands on the towel still wrapped around her and reaches for the phone with dread, turning the volume on the TV down. "Yes..?" She asks hesitantly, fearing the worst.

"Ah, Shamira!" an achingly familiar English accent exits the phone, and Shamira heaves a sigh of complete and utter relief.

"Joseph, thank God!" She could have wept from happiness. "I-I just saw a news report, about a commercial airliner having an emergency landing near Hong Kong. The reporter said it departed Japan and was destined for Egypt, but something happened and there were casualties and I—" Shamira's voice wavers, and she has to stop and swallow the lump in her throat. "I was so worried."

"I can only imagine, I'm sorry," Joseph apologizes, and she can hear that comforting smile in his voice. "We're all safe though, you needn't worry any longer," he reassures her. Shamira starts firing off a multitude of questions, asking what has happened, if Dio is responsible, where the group is, and Joseph has to cut her off with a chuckle. "Shamira, slow down! Listen, I'll answer all your questions soon, but for now we need to regroup; I hope you're hungry."

At the mention of food, Shamira's nose registers the smell of burning egg and she whips around with a horrified gasp. Rose Watcher manifests on command and snatches the pan off the stove, switching the burner off in the process, and Shamira can't help but stare at the charred egg with a dejected frown.

"Well," she says, "whatever I had planned looks like it went through a furnace, so I would love to have breakfast with you guys."

"Wonderful!" Joseph exclaims with a laugh, and Shamira grabs a pen and jots the direction he gives to the restaurant onto the palm of her hand. "You get all that?"

"Yep! I'll see you guys in a bit!"

"See you soon," he pauses, "and Shamira?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you for joining us."

Shamira grins.

"Of course Joseph, anything for you."

Shamira dresses quickly after the phone call.

She dons a white tank top and a loose, tan, elbow length, button-up shirt over it, then slides into a pair of dark brown slacks. She tucks her shirt into the slacks, which are held up by a leather belt with a bronze, ankh emblazoned buckle, and while she figures she should bring her hijab, she opts to wear it wrapped around her leg instead of shoving it into her satchel. She then ties a braided bracelet around her right wrist and fastens a leather cord choker around her neck; a circular steel tag hung from it, engraved with her Zodiac, the Pisces. As she turns to the mirror, slipping on a pair of tiny jade scarab earrings Muhammad had gotten her when she was a little girl, she examines her appearance.

Shamira is short, only about 162 cm, but she knows she's stronger than she looks and she prides herself in having excellent equilibrium. Her body is thin and lean, her hips just a bit wider than her shoulders, and her feet are quite large for her size. She could thank her dad for that. She decides to wear her hair unstyled and natural, and it was cut to medium length with curly and poofy corkscrews; she can easily tie it back when she needs the hijab though.

Shamira rubs her left arm nervously. Uncle Muhammad wasn't going to be happy about the ink that's on it but…

Screw it, it wasn't like he's happy she ran off to Hong Kong anyway. Might as well add one more thing to his ever growing List of Disappointments. Shamira loves her uncle to death but sometimes he can be a little overbearing.

The clock on her dresser reads 7:09, and she knows she needs to get moving so she doesn't leave the group waiting, so she hurries and finishes packing. In go six boxes of film for her camera, a stick of deodorant, her hairbrush, a couple hairbands, and her toothbrush and paste. She also slides in a small photo album, although her Polaroid hangs from her neck by a strap, safely folded in on itself. She slips on her shoes, a pair of large, worn, leather men's boots that belonged to her dad, and grabs her keys.

Shamira stands in the middle of her apartment and wonders if she's forgotten anything important. She's pretty sure she has the necessities, and her cycle ended a few days prior so she doesn't need any of that stuff. As she looks around, she also wonders how long she'll be gone for.

Probably a few weeks, she thinks, but she figures she should inform her landlord.

Shamira decides some thank-yous are in order. She opens the cupboard in the kitchen and reaches for a large pickle jar that sits on the top shelf, carefully balancing it in her hands and placing it on the counter. The jar is almost completely full of money, dollar bills and coins that she shoved in from her job as a waitress, along with the money she gained doing a few other "odd jobs". It'll suffice though, so Shamira grabs it, flips the light switch off, and walks out her front door without a second glance at the interior of what has been her home for the last few months.

She locks the door quickly and takes an elevator to the ground floor, and just as she steps out she nearly walks into her landlord, an elderly Chinese woman named Kwan Yazhu.

How convenient.

"Hello Mrs. Kwan," Shamira chirps in English, and the old woman jumps in surprise.

"Oh! Good morning Shamira!" she responds with a smile. Her accent is strong but comforting, and Shamira can't help but smile back.

Mrs. Kwan is just a few centimeters taller than Shamira, and she always seems to have a sunny disposition around her. Her face is layered in deep wrinkles, with high cheekbones, a squared jaw, and long silver hair pulled into a loose bun. Her clothes are simple: a white blouse, a long, cream skirt, and dark red flats. She's largely ordinary in appearance, but she's also one of the kindest people Shamira has ever met in her life.

Shamira had honestly gotten lucky when she met Mrs. Kwan. She'd been in Hong Kong for a full three days before they had met; Shamira was just barely surviving off the money she had "borrowed" from Joseph, and by that point she only had a few dollars left. Mrs. Kwan came across her when she had hunkered down in some grimy alleyway for the night, and for some reason decided this foreign girl was the person she needed to help. Shamira wasn't sure why the old woman had helped her, of all people; it wasn't like she was the only homeless person in Hong Kong. She thought that maybe it was her vitiligo that caught her attention, that or she just looked so pathetic camping out in that alley, but regardless of the reason, she wasn't going to complain. Mrs. Kwan took her in, put a roof over her head, gave her food to eat and a bed to sleep in, and told Shamira that if she could find a job within the next week, she'd let her have an apartment for half the usual price.

Shamira wondered why this old woman was helping a complete stranger out like this, and when she had asked, Mrs. Kwan simply replied with, "It's the right thing to do". Shamira had started crying on the spot when she heard that.

Needless to say, she did get a job, quite a few actually, and once she had the money to pay the rent, the rest was history.

"Where are you off to this morning?" asks the old woman, and it Shamira snaps out of her thoughts.

"About that…" Shamira begins, but then she hesitates; she's not really sure how to begin, and the elderly woman tilts her head in confusion.

"Is something wrong, dear?" Mrs. Kwan asks again. Shamira closes her eyes and smiles, then holds the money-filled pickle jar out to her landlord.

"I'm leaving Hong Kong for a while, Mrs. Kwan, and I wanted to give this to you as thanks for helping me out like you have," Shamira announces. "You've done so much for me, and I really can't thank you enough." Mrs. Kwan looks utterly flabbergasted, and Shamira might have laughed at the moment if she wasn't trying to be serious.

"Leaving? Is everything alright? This seems so sudden."

Shamira's smile only widens. "Don't worry, everything is fine. I'm going on a trip back to Egypt with some friends and family, and I don't know how long I'll be gone for, so I wanted to give you this." Technically it isn't a lie.

Mrs. Kwan reaches for the jar and grasps it gingerly. "Shamira, this looks like a lot of money…" she mutters, worry seeping into her voice.

"Consider it down payment for rent for the next few months, in case I'm gone for awhile." Or in case that I don't return at all.

"W-Well, alright then. Just— You make sure you stay safe, okay? I couldn't bear to think of you getting hurt," Mrs. Kwan cautions, her voice cracking.

Shamira's throat tightens. "I-I will, I promise," she murmurs. Mrs. Kwan places the jar on the floor and quickly embraces her.

"You'll do good, I know you will," she comforts. Shamira wraps her arms around the old woman and buries her face in her shoulder. It's like she knows… They stay that way for a few more seconds, and as they part Shamira rapidly blinks away the tears that threatened to spill over. "Take care of yourself, Shamira."

"Goodbye, Mrs. Kwan," she whispers. The elderly woman smiles, then bends down to pick the jar up, cradling it in her arms. She steps into the elevator and presses a button, and as the doors close the two woman bow to each other in a final farewell.

Once the metallic doors close, Shamira can hear the elevator begin its ascent, she takes a deep breath, squares her shoulders, and spins on her heel before striding out of the apartment building with a look of sheer determination written across her face.

The last time she counted the contents of that pickle jar, it held almost HK$20,000[2]; Mrs. Kwan will get a use out of it, Shamira is sure of that.

If there's one thing Shamira El-Amin is sure of, it's that her sense of direction is so fucking bad a headless chicken can find its way around easier than her.

Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration, but it certainly doesn't feel that way right now.

Here she is, practically wandering the streets of the Wan Chai District, trying to find that damn restaurant Joseph had asked her to meet him at; meanwhile she still struggles with reading most of the kanji that surrounds her, and of course the restaurant is in an area she doesn't have mapped out in her head yet. She's only been living in Hong Kong for four months at this point, and she's pretty sure that part of the reason she hasn't died yet, besides dear Mrs. Kwan's help of course, is because she can at least speak English. She sends a silent thank-you to Uncle Muhammad for encouraging her to broaden her English during her youth, because now she is completely fluent in it; Cantonese, on the other hand, is not something she's grasping very easily.

In the entire time she's been in Hong Kong, she's only run into a few people who knew Arabic, but none of them spoke Egyptian Arabic specifically and that kinda bums her out.

Shamira would be lying if she said she doesn't miss Egypt. It may be largely desert and reach 40°C during the summer, but God dammit it was her home and she loved it there. She wants to go back, to return to her birth city of Cairo, and she really just wants to sleep in her bed again. She wants to resume her apprenticeship with Muhammad in the Khan el-Khalili, because that was something Shamira lived for. Watching him perform his Tarot readings to predict a person's future, or when she got to read the palms of tourists and natives alike, those were the highlights of her day. The aroma of cooked foods and spices permeated the souq regularly, and it was always alive with the chatter of merchants and the hustle and bustle of the customers. And the lights, God, those lights; they littered the marketplace like beacons, and at night they were the stars, guiding people through the stone tunnels and streets. Shamira is a firm believer that anyone who visits Cairo has to experience Khan el-Khalili at least once in their life, and she could not have been happier experiencing it every day of hers.

And then that Dio asshole came into the picture and ruined it all.

Shamira will never forget that night they left Egypt. She was coming down with something and, on Muhammad's request, had returned home earlier than usual to try and get some rest. The sun was just setting when she had fallen asleep, but when she awoke a few hours later to her uncle stumbling through the front door, utterly terrified, her stomach dropped. He rushed to the landline in the kitchen and started dialing, throwing an order over his shoulder for her to get ready to leave immediately; any questions she tried to ask fell on deaf ears because Muhammad was too preoccupied with shouting into the phone. He asked for Joseph Joestar, stating it was an urgent and serious matter, and upon hearing that name Shamira bolted for her room to get ready.

She knew who Joseph Joestar was. An older man in his late sixties, Joseph was a British-American who specialized in the dangerously extreme and the extremely dangerous; during 1939, he had saved the entire world from the Pillar Men, ancient and immortal beings who wanted to use the human race as livestock. He had stopped them, but not without sacrifices. Numerous lives were lost, including his best friend Caesar, and during the final battle against the leader of the Pillar Men, a beast named Kars, both he and his mother had nearly died themselves.

When Shamira had first met Joseph, it was a little over two years prior when he came to Egypt to research some ancient coffin that had surfaced off the Atlantic Coast of Africa. She later learned that coffin had contained the body of Dio, or to be more accurate, the body of Joseph's grandfather with Dio's head attached. Considering the fact that Uncle Muhammad looked as if he had come face to face with Death itself, and now he was calling Joseph because of an "urgent and serious matter," Shamira had a hunch it involved the vampire. In less than an hour they were on a plane to New York, and by the time they had reached the city with the towering turquoise statue, Shamira was exhausted. Turns out Dio was the reason they left, and Muhammad had barely escaped the attack with his life.

But she didn't want to be in New York. It wasn't that she didn't like it, she actually found it fascinating to be in a new country, and ever since she had met Joseph she had always wanted to visit America. But lately she'd been developing this grotesque urge to get out and live on her own and do her own thing. So what did she decide to do?

She stole some money and hopped on the first plane to Hong Kong.

Part of her knows she should have just stayed with Muhammad in New York after they fled Egypt, but nooooo, she had to be independent, never mind the fact she was 17 years old and had decided to live on the other side of the freaking planet, alone.

Fucking Dio.

"Excusez-moi[3], could you possibly help me with something?"

Shamira flinches and whirls around on the speaker, her entire body tense, and she summons Rose Watcher on reflex. Shit, that's a bad first impression.

The owner of the question, an out of place man, doesn't even seem bothered by her jumpy reaction. He doesn't respond to her Stand, which she expected; she'd only met one individual in Hong Kong who could see Rose Watcher, and that person was a little girl. Shamira gives the man a quick once over: he was tall, a lot taller than her, and besides his odd clothing the most noteworthy features he has are that he's Caucasian, lacks eyebrows, and has the weirdest hairstyle she has ever seen. It looks like someone flipped him upside down and dipped his head into a bucket of hair gel. The strands are silver in color and stand straight up, cut flat across the top, and she can't help but wonder how the hell he manages to style that every day. He raises an eyebrow… ridge at her in confusion, probably because she's staring at his hair, and she has to force herself to meet his eyes.

"Um, sure, what did you need help with?" She responds with a forced smile. He grins in turn, and there's this subtle undertone that she can only describe as menacing; the first thing that comes to mind when she sees it is the Cheshire cat, and oh, now she's really creeped out.

"I was wondering if you could give me directions to the Tiger Balm Garden?" he asks cheerfully, and just a hint of a French accent tinges his voice, but that bright demeanor he has only makes her more uneasy. "I had planned on visiting it today but, well," he barks out a sharp laugh, "it seems I've taken a wrong turn somewhere along the way."

Shamira chuckles nervously. "Yeah, that's an easy thing to do here in Hong Kong, it's like a labyrinth." This guy might creep her out, but she figures she should still help him because, as Mrs. Kwan had put it so eloquently before, it's the right thing to do. "You're gonna want to follow this street, then turn right at the first corner. Take your second left, and you'll hit a large road; just keep following that south and eventually you'll find the Garden."

"Merci[4], much appreciated!" he says, that same grin still in place, and he gives a sort of mock salute before turning around. "Have a wonderful day!"

She waits until he falls in step with the ever-increasing crowd of Hong Kongers before releasing a breath she doesn't realize she's even holding. She has no idea who that man is, but the vibes he gave off were more than a little disturbing. At least she sent him in the opposite direction though, away from her her. Shamira sighs and continues forward in her endeavor to find that stupid restaurant, which the others were probably already at by now.

Turns out the building is right around the corner. Go figure.

Shamira feels this shit-eating grin grow on her face when she sees it, especially because she's even able to read the kanji well enough to know it's the right place. Her hands begin to tremble and she suddenly realizes how nervous she actually is; this will be the first time she's seen her uncle since she left New York. But despite the nerves, she is also excited. Not only is she going to see Muhammad, she's also going see Joseph again and she gets to meet his grandson, and to top it all off, she's going back to Egypt.

Shamira steels her nerves and shakes her hands out in an attempt at calming herself down. No point in wasting anymore time, she thinks, so she takes a deep breath, pushes the entrance door open, and steps into the building.

[1] As far as I'm aware, we're never actually told where in Japan the Kujo family lives, so I had to be a little creative here. Apparently Kakyoin's name comes from a neighborhood that's located in Sendai, the capital city of the Miyagi Prefecture in Japan, so I figured that would be a good enough location to use as a starting point. Although I imagine Kakyoin having that name isn't any different than someone having the name Dallas, or London, or even India, and just because it's his name it doesn't mean he, or any of the others, actually live in that location. Again, it's mostly just for a reference point, and because I wanted to specify a location in the news report.

[2] HK$20,000 is a lot of money, just thought you guys should know that.

[3] Excusez-moi = excuse me.

[4] Merci = thanks.

It's also really weird writing all of Shamira's responses to Avdol as "Muhammad" because I'm so used to referring to him only as Avdol since that's literally what everyone else calls him.

Please review! It helps me grow and I want to know what you readers think of the story so far.

P.S. I will not be following a strict updating schedule for this story; I will update when I do. Please respect this.

Until next time~