Disclaimer: I don't own Noir, quite obviously, or any of these characters. Which is good, because I'd complete ruin them and the wonderful Noir story.

Review if you'd like and thanks for reading.

Setting/Time: After the end of the series, because Chloe is dead and it's so much easier to write MK when she's out of the picture.

Mireille had never bothered to clean the mess off the floor. The plant still laid there, its withered leaves dried on the floor in their own misery. She eyed those once green shapes with thoughtful eyes, her fingers lacing through her hair. To her right the walls of their apartment rose, a small letter tacked to its side. The subtle handwriting of an assassin dug into the snow paper, covering a distinct two pages. On that paper laid the thoughts and feelings of that black haired Noir, emotionless though she may have been. There had been nothing at the end to tell who it was from, but how could the blonde not know?

At the time, there had been no Kirika. Mireille had decided then and there to leave for that manor knowing full well she'd never return. It was her destiny to die there on those grounds. Chloe had said it herself, but she'd made Kirika a promise of death and she'd journeyed on. In any case, at the very bottom of that letter Mireille had signed her own name. There were no words she could give to a nonexistent Kirika. She could only give her own life, and perhaps, a name.

Footsteps echoed in the hall behind her and stopped at her own door. Crossing her arms and moving her eyes to the window, Mireille waited. 3, 2, 1, the door clicked open and a distraught looking Kirika stepped in. Her eyes scanned the premise until they alit on the figure all alone in the bitter light of the moon.

"Mireille. . . ?" it asked, confusion evident in the way she spoke. The blue eyed figure turned her head back, a slight smile spread across her face.

"I know," she answered. "It's ugly." The normal red garment of a slutty looking Mireille had been replaced by a faded grey sweater, loose genes, and bare feet. "I wanted to see how it is to be you," Mireille continued, her hands shifting in the pockets of that warm over garment. "By all means, you should be dead. These clothes are cumbersome." She got no response from the brown eyed individual. Stares were common among the two of them. Clearly, Kirika's brain did not move as fast as her feet.

"No, the plant," Kirika responded, a small sigh riding onto her own face as her eyes shifted towards the ground. It was strewn there, her own mark of failure.

"I don't want to clean it up."

And neither of them would. Every day they had this conversation, in different words. Each time it ended with silence. Then they'd make tea and stare off into the darkness. Who knew what had started the ritual? Kirika had sworn she'd have tea with Chloe again and here they were every night in the moon, the dead haunting her memory. The black haired girl couldn't help but to think that perhaps Chloe was there. The shining knife was her after all, at least in spirit.

"Mint," Mirielle remarked smugly, settling herself onto the nearest chair, eyes towards that letter again. Had Kirika noted its presence in all the months they'd been here? As the wound began to heal, the blonde was sure she could spy the other glancing in its direction. Had she lifted the pages in the other's absence, only to catch a glimpse of something perhaps more despairing than the fact they were both still alive?

A clunk announced the presence of a heated kettle, Kirika's slender fingers wrapped tightly around its handle. "What defines a shadow?" she asked all of a sudden.

A concerned expression crossed Mireille's face as she reached for the tea kettle. For a moment she had no answer, and expectantly curled her own fingers around that handle as well. Her own hands fell against the others and she looked down in surprise. She could have sworn the other had taken her hand away. A bit razzled, she quickly thought up an answer to the question. "A darkness caused by lack of light."

"No. . ." Kirika answered uncurling her fingers and letting her hand slide out from the other's. "It is light where there once was none." Mireille narrowed her eyes carefully, unsure of what Kirika meant. Then she understood all at once.

"If you combine to shadows, perhaps you do not need light from which to see," she finished her features relaxing as she poured two cups of the steaming liquid, sending one sliding towards Kirika with a light flick of her wrist. Oh how she hated riddles.

They sipped tea for a time, each one finding other things to focus on that did not include their own faces. Each tiny bit of information stored in their skulls for later. "I haven't pointed a gun at you in a while," Mireille noted all at once, attempting to break the silence with humor.

"No," Kirika answered, watching her tea shake lightly from side to side before she rose and drifted to the shining window. She rested her hands lightly on the sill, scanning the streets below. A car door slammed. A child and mother emerged, tightly wrapped in coats. They hurried their way from the glistening streets into the hidden doors beneath them.

The tingling presence of another quickly joined Kirika, and she looked up to see Mireille also gazed out into the street. How had she not felt her move? The blonde looked saddened by something as she watched the mother and child disappear from view. "I don't remember my brother, mother, father," she said quietly. "Unless a faded dream counts." She slid a finger on the dirtied edge of the window. "And you don't have a name. But. . ."

Kirika leaned slightly towards her in anticipation. But?

"But. . . you remember, and I have a name."

Kirika looked back through to her view, letting her right hand fall to her side. Mirielle looked so sullen now. Usually she was all that and a bag of flaming peas. Making up sentences and words to cover up the obvious nervousness in her voice. She did succeed in making herself brave, but Kirika could tell there was some sort of plead in this sound now.

She opened and closed a fist before closing her eyes and taking the risk. She moved to the right and folded her fingers over the others wrist, squeezing it lightly. She smiled lightly, hoping perhaps Mireille would offer her some sort of sign that this was okay. Maybe it was alright to show compassion between the two of them.

The blonde turned to look, but did not pull away or tense. Seconds stretched by into minutes until Mireille's right hand came to rest on the other's that gripped her left wrist so tightly.

"We are Noir. We are our own family and I remember you."