"I guess I should start by introducing myself" The lavender-haired woman stood up straight and clasped her hands behind her back. " I am Shinoa Hiiragi of Hiiragi & Co. , a company you will not be familiar with, and this " She said signalling to the man behind Yoichi " is my associate Yuuichirou Hyakuya"

"Shinoa, I don't think it's safe to give him our real names" Yuuichirou practically hissed " Since we still haven't confirmed whether or not he's working for them"

Shinoa simply laughed at his query "I thought he could have been a potential threat, but..." She looked Yoichi up and down again "He doesn't look like he could hurt anyone. Nevermind us" The sound of the door, behind them, shutting echoed through the room.

"I wouldn't doubt him Shinoa" Another voice joined the conversation. Yoichi recognized it as the voice that had spoken to him in the car, claiming they were here to 'protect' him. He felt the colour drain from his face. Two people were in that car. Two people ready to restrain , or even kill, him if he made any attempt at escape. The voice continued, even though it had a somewhat playful tone, it sent shivers down Yoichi's spine. " He managed to slip right out of Yuu-chan's grasp. In fact, if he hadn't backed himself into a tree we might have never got him" Yoichi mentally kicked himself. If he wasn't so clumsy he could be in a police station right now filing some report, instead of being surrounded by threatening people trying to suss out whether he was a threat to them.

"Well, if he's that clumsy then he's surely not capable of much," Shinoa said in a mocking tone. She looked him over once again" You did check him for weapons, right?"

" Of course, we did" The voice answered " He doesn't have any weapons"

"Or anything that could potentially be used as a weapon," Yuuichirou said, sounding disinterested.

"So he's really just a normal civilian" The small woman let out a breath, that could have been mistaken for a sigh of relief "That makes things a lot easier" She turned to Yoichi "You aren't going to try and hurt us are you, Mr. Saotome?"

Yoichi gave a slight shake of his head. He felt afraid to move under the three piercing gazes on him.

"Well, I guess I should start explaining your situation to you" Shinoa slipped into a small brown chair and signaled to the one in front of her" If you'd sit down Mr. Saotome, I can begin" Yoichi walked over to the chair, in a way he hoped didn't raise any suspicion. He could still feel their eyes clinging to him intently. He'd always hated being the centre of attention and now he was slap-bang in the middle of the wrong type of attention.

He sat down , bunching his hands at the hem of his blue sweater. Shinoa threaded her fingers below her chest, giving him a pleased look. " You're familiar with Tomoe Saotome , correct?"

"Yes, she's my sister" Yoichi replied, wondering how his dead sister was relevant to any of this. " But she's been dead for a year"

" We are aware that Tomoe Saotome is indeed deceased but do you know why she came to be that way ?" Shinoa gave him a witty smirk "You were the one to identify her body,no? I'm sure you noticed some irregular wounds on her corpse" He thought back to the day he'd been called in to identify Tomoe's body. He remembered falling to his knees, after seeing the tarnished flesh of his sister's body, and choking out through his tears that 'Yes, that's Tomoe'. He remembered the cold, uncaring faces of the policemen , as they wrote something down.

"Yes, but those were-" Yoichi started only to be stopped by Shinoa.

"Unfortunate indicators of violence" She sat back further in her chair "She died because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. That's what they told you, right? She was just got mixed up in some gang violence, completely unrelated to her."

He nodded. Yoichi wasn't sure where this was going. Or how this stranger knew exactly what the police had told him.

Shinoa leaned forwards, intimidating him with the lack of space between them."But what if I told you Toeme was related to the gang violence, that resulted in her demise"

"That's impossible" Yoichi retorted, straightening his posture. He knew he shouldn't be challenging these people when they could kill him whenever they felt the need, but this was his sister. This was Toeme they were talking about. Good,well,behaved Toeme. Toeme, who always did her homework. Toeme, who always took care of everyone and anyone. Toeme, who used to buy Yoichi sweets whenever he asked. Toeme, who was basically the definition of Miss Perfect. There was no way she was related to the violence that killed her. She was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just as he had been told. Yoichi shook any thoughts of Tomoe's involvement out of his head. "There's no way"

Shinoa gave him a wry smile" Oh, but there is a way ." She reached back ,grabbing a piece of paper from a desk behind her. Shinoa handed him the paper. " If you look here Tomoe..." She said pointing to a large negative sum of money "was in incredible debt"

"She was a college student" Yoichi shook his head. He refused to believe any of this. "All college students are in debt"

The small woman rolled her eyes at him, pointing at the sum again."Yes, I am aware that all college students are screwed when it comes to money but..." She circled the number with her finger"As a college student yourself, isn't that a large amount? Even for someone as in debt as a student" Yoichi couldn't answer. Yes, it was a large number but there must have been another explanation for this other then what this woman was implying. Shinoa crossed her legs satisfied by his silence"I'm sorry you have to hear this from me, but..." She gave him a look, that was some sick mix between mocking and apathy" , your sister was a druggie" She uncrossed her legs, once again invading Yoichi's personal space "She was quite a desperate one at that" Shinoa began to fiddle with a piece of her hair" Once one dealer got tired of waiting for their money, she'd jump to the next. Sadly one company she 'jumped' to was much more dangerous than she could have anticipated. These were Tomoe's murderers" There was a drawn out silence before , for the first time since the conversation started, Shinoa's face took on grave seriousness. "But these aren't the people after you"

"After me?" Yoichi people after him? Why? Even if Tomoe was as these people were telling him it had nothing to do with him, so what did anyone want with him?

"Indeed, there are people after you. That is why we brought you here." Her tone was becoming slightly annoyed. Yoichi couldn't help feeling like she had no right, to feel that way. He was the one who woke up blindfolded in a car, had his entire image of his sister changed and was surrounded by only god knows who. He immediately straightened his emotions out. He'd been taught to put other before him but this had to be the exception. Respecting these people's feelings was ridiculous. Yet, here he was, feeling sorry for annoying this woman. Shinoa changed her tone back to calm and ,slightly, mocking "There are two drug companies involved in bringing you here" She put up two fingers "Soundmind, your sister's murderers" She pulled back one of her fingers "They believe that if you can't pay them you need to die. But..." She put down the finger she pulled" Soundmind has become inactive" She tugged on her second finger" That's where the second company comes in, Akimbo. Since Tomoe owed them so much, we believe Akimbo annihilated Soundmind. This theory is supported by Akimbo's beliefs. They believe that if you owe them money you will earn it."

Yoichi still didn't understand any of this. It didn't explain why he was here at all."What does any of this have to do with me?" He asked. He was desperate now. If he knew more maybe he could convince these people to let him go. But then did he want to go? If these 'companies' were really after him did he really want to leave whatever protection these people were offering? God, this whole situation was HOPELESS. Either way he was fucked.

"What does this have to do with you indeed,Mr. Saotome" Her tone was condescending and her grin sickening. Just a reminder of why he needed to get the fuck away. Shinoa's voice halted his thoughts "Recently, one of our best hackers managed to hack the Akimbo systems and access their 'hit list'. There was only one name left" She gave a look that could kill "Yoichi Saotome"

Yoichi shivered, at the mention of his name. " Why am I on their list?" This didn't make sense. This wasn't fair. Yoichi was just a normal twenty-four-year-old. He went to school to make ,the remainder of, his family happy. He groaned when he had to buy overly expensive textbooks, that he was only going to use once. Sure, he wasn't the most sociable but he didn't deserve any of this. He could feel tears begging to spill from his eyes. No. There was no fucking way he was going to cry in front of these people.

"Yoichi" Shinoa leaned forward. Her serious face had returned,but Yoichi could have sworn he heard some sympathy in her voice."You are Tomoe's only sibling. Her debt has been passed onto you"

"But, I'm not her only family member" He couldn't stop his voice from coming out choked. He felt stung by his own selfishness. If he didn't deserve this, nobody else in his family did.

"It's because your the only one who fits their age range" Yoichi looked up, meeting magenta eyes. "Though we're not sure what their system for 'earning' back money is, we know they have an age range. The range is between twelve and thirty-three. Along with the age range, the state of victim's bodies is also consistent. They're always mangled beyond recognition and..." Shinoa's face twisted with a rare disgust "...warm"She shifted her face back to its natural expression" That is why you are here. We are going to protect you. You will be staying with us for a long time"

"But what about my parents? They're definitely going to realise I'm missing." Yoichi couldn't believe he was willing to co-operate with these people.

"You mean parent," Shinoa said, her tone completely reverted back to apathetic and mocking.

"Huh?"

"You have no friends, your sister is dead and your father has been supposedly absent since you were seventeen."

"SHINOA!"The voice, from earlier, shouted.

"What?!" Shinoa rolled her eyes "Is it more about that empathy thing?"She glared behind Yoichi, at the origin of the voice" You know I'm not good at that, Mika"

Yoichi didn't care that she had just pointed out every problem in his life, he just wanted to know if his mother was okay." So, what about my parent?"

Shinoa broke her piercing glare at 'Mika'."One of my other associates is telling her of your amazing opportunity."

"Amazing opportunity?" He never had any opportunity, before all this.

"Yes, you've been chosen to go to a prestigious school ,but due to having to work so hard to meet expectations, you won't be able to contact her for a long time" Shinoa smiled at him " You're a smart boy, Yoichi. Now if you had the intelligence of Yuu over there, it'd be a harder lie to sell" Shinoa remark was met with an indignant 'hey' from Yuuichirou and a warning 'SHINOA!' from Mika.

She brushed them both off."Since there is nothing else for you to know, you can go now" She pointed to a gray-walled hallway"You'll be staying in the second door to the left" With that the conversation was over.

Yoichi stood up, ignoring his legs protesting from being sat still for long. As he made his way to the hallway, voices started up behind him.

"You know you could have sat still" He heard, Yuuichirou moan.

"But explaining is so boring"Shinoa responded cheekily

Yoichi walked to the second door to the left and opened the door,tiredly. Inside was two beds, two chests of drawers and a window, clearly showing the dark night sky. A WINDOW. All the tiredness left Yoichi's body,as he rushed over to it. He tried to open the window, only to discover it was locked.

"Don't even try." Yuuichirou's voice rang gruffly down the hallway "All the windows are locked"Fuck!

The tired feeling ,along with hopelessness, burdened Yoichi's body, as he placed himself on the bed. If he couldn't escape physically, he would escape mentally. He closed his eyes, praying for a dream of before all this. Before Tomoe died. Before his father left, Back when he had friends. He prayed for a normal dream.

Because he wasn't normal anymore.