CHAPTER TWO

The Investigation

Alexandria Spencer snuck a glance at the tall, lean man next to her. His eyelids were lowered in a way that made her wonder if he had forgotten that she was walking alongside him. To his defense, it was easy to given her shorter statuette of just over five foot four but she was eighty five percent sure his nonchalant acceptance for lunch followed by an abrupt period of ignoring her went beyond it. He looked…well, lonely. Bored. Those dark blue eyes of his stared straight ahead but once she was caught, his expression changed. It was more open, more normal. "Huh? Is there something on my face?" he asked monotonously, scratching the edge of a well-defined jaw.

"Nothing!" she said quickly and looked away but he stilled seemed curious.

"So why are you in Japan anyway?" he asked. "And uh, is it safe for you to be wandering...alone?" Again, something told her to keep quiet but she wasn't here undercover, not really. And she doubted he had any affiliation to the people the MI-6 sent her to investigate. She decided to ignore the subtle hint he had dropped of his idea of her being just another little girl. "How old do I look to you?" hhe asked, her eyes on him.

He blinked and stopped. He examined her carefully for a second that felt much too long before leaning back with an estimate. "Sixteen?"

Her eye twitched. And she stared at him completely unabashed but irritated. It was the height, she knew it. She was always discredited because she still looked like a little teenager. It wasn't her fault she stopped growing since the beginning of her high school year, that to her credit, only took two years to complete. Pulling out from the thoughts, she asked quietly, "do I look sixteen to you?" She challenged in a low voice, her light blue almost colourless eyes were ablaze. He laughed almost nervously, running his fingers through his dark hair and smiled apologetically.

"I guess not," he said easily and continued walking, "eighteen?"

"Bingo."

"And you're here…as a tourist?"

She sighed and stopped again, crossing her arms. "Do I look like a tourist?" she asked this time, a humorous fatigue tone in her voice. His eyes flicker to hers quickly and curved with his polite smile.

"Well I am helping you find somewhere to eat," he reminded her and it was her time to be taken back. She had completely forgot, getting lost in walking – not to mention staring – instead. She opened her mouth to say something when her phone buzzed in her pocket. "One second," she murmured as her eyebrows knit together in a reaction to the name on the screen. Decade. "Hello?"

"Are you alone?"

She looked at Li, who was politely looking everywhere except her but she had a lingering suspicion that he was listening on. Still, it wasn't hard to disguise her answer and she knew the value of having civilian assistance when in a foreign country. She wasn't going to leave him too quickly until she gathered some information off him. "Yes, I am." There was a pause on the other line before her superior's baritone voice returned.

"We've verified the intel you found about the mafia. You have the go to carry out the mission." And then the line was over. A smile pulled up on the girl's mouth and Li looked at her.

"Something wrong?" he asked.

"Not at all, but I should get going." She grinned at him. "Thanks for…well, this much." She held out a hand to him and he stared at it for a moment before taking it firmly. Immediately she knew that his hands were callused, his fingers thin and long – hands of someone who worked. Hard. Not a student. As he pulled his hands away, her eyes caught the slightest blisters at the where the top of his palm and the base of his fingers met - indication of bar work. Either he was lifting weights, or he was an acrobat. But of course that didn't meant he was a threat. Plenty of students worked out, she reminded herself. And yet...something's off. She looked up into his dark blue eyes and there was that same controlled, curious gaze. "It was nice meeting you."

A polite smile pulled up on his mouth. "You too, Ally." And as she turned and walked away, his face changed again and he looked every bit like the MI-6 agent thought he was: a silent, dangerous man.

0-0

"So Yin, who was she?" Huang asked, holding up a newspaper to conceal the lower part of his face as he addressed the petite girl on the swing set. Her violet eyes were far-gazed as her bare feet dug into the sand. She remembered the way her sensor indicated another girl – and not the usual pink haired, anime obsessed one – but when the stranger had talked to her, it was…normal. Weather. People. The city. Answers to questions anyone could have answered.

"I don't know," she said quietly, emotionlessly. It was then a black cat jumped on her lap, and her hands tighten around the chains.

"Well just be glad Hei distracted her so that we could get you out of there in time," Mao said, his voice tinted with the slightest scold. Unlike Huang who thought Yin would freely give away information as Dolls tended to when commanded, Mao didn't believe that Yin would betray them as much as she would be used as a hostage. He wasn't sure of himself what the entire encounter was about, but he did not believe Yin to be on the opposing side. "Something bad could have happened."

"It wouldn't have." Her voice was soft but the fact that she was protesting – mildly but going against them, nonetheless – was strange. In fact, her slowly developing emotions and independence didn't go unnoticed. "She wouldn't have."

Huang grunted, crushing the paper in his hands. He got up bristly. "What did she want?" he asked gruffly, his voice serious. She hesitated.

"She asked for my name, where I was from," the young girl answered, "and what I do."

"What did you say?"

"Nothing." Nothing except the fact that others called her Yin and that she simply watched people.

-X-

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