Setsuka was surprised.

She looked over the offers written down, there were actually quite a few.

"Two of the ones that stood out were the offers from extremely popular Kei artists." Konoe offered hesitantly.

Cain had stiffened next to her.

She looked at the list, trying to find the offers Konoe mentioned. Sho Fuwa and Vie Ghoul. Both were requesting that she act in their next music video.

"But I can't act." She stated.

"You wouldn't really need to." Konoe explained. "Music videos with these types of artists are usually quite simple. It would be a matter of following directions really." Setsuka made a face but nodded and looked back down at the other offers.

Konoe's voice was full of excitement once again. "There was another one for-"

"Let's go." Cain said abruptly, standing up. Konoe blanched and took a few steps back, his face gone ashen from the glare he received.

"B-but…" Konoe tried, but Cain paid no attention to him.

Setsuka looked up at him from her chair in pure annoyance.

"Let's go." Cain repeated, grabbing at her arm. She rolled her eyes and got up, allowing him to pull her along to the elevator.

"No."

"But Nii-san-" Setsuka tried again.

"No." Cain snapped, once more.

He had nearly dragged her all the way home from Konoe's office. She had let him, of course. He had seemed genuinely angry but she still didn't understand why..

"Why can't I?"

It wasn't as if she really wanted to act or anything but if she had something like that to work on she could stay in Japan with him longer instead of going back to school. Tragic Marker was the first foreign role that Cain had accepted and even that was only because Setsuka had begged him too. It was too large of an offer to turn down. And now he had a whole stack of offers from companies wanting to represent him and offers from directors who wanted to cast him in their projects. She just hadn't realized that he wouldn't allow her to stay with him throughout the entire filming process. The last few months had been lonely for her. England was too cold and too dark without him.

"I don't want you to. I want you to go back to England and finish your schooling. You don't need to be distracted."

She had pouted then, the idea of having to separate from him again made her steel eyes misty with unshed tears. She understood his concern of course, it wasn't as though he didn't want her to stay but he would blame himself even more if she dropped out of school to stay with him. But even still, she had no idea what she wanted to do after she finished school. She hadn't ever thought about it. The idea of creating another person that was also yourself in a way seemed appealing, she at least wanted to try it. He was always so overprotective of her, ever since they had left their home, as if he wanted to keep her to himself and hide her from the world.

"What if I transferred to a school here?" She offered.

The idea had been in her head for a while now. She had looked around at schools around the area and even glanced over their enrollment requirements. Japan's school system was more demanding of her than England's but she was still confident she could pass with a little extra work.

Cain looked bewildered. "A school here? In Japan?"

Setsuka smirked at him.

"Yes. Unlike you, I'm actually fluent in the language. A shame mum didn't raise you to be bilingual." She regretted the words as soon as they left her mouth. They didn't talk about their parents. Mentioning them always made Cain distant as if the thought of their life before now filled him with emotions he couldn't handle so he just shut off. She wanted to talk about them, though. She really had no idea if her mother had cared that her only children had vanished in the night, leaving her boyfriend a bloody, brutalized mess, and hadn't been seen in almost three years. Did she really not care about them at all?

She didn't even know if her father was alive or not.

Setsuka shuddered at the thought and wrapped her arms around herself. That night plagued her daydreams. The happiness and raw joy she had felt being with her father, the look in her brother's eye as he walked in on them, the sounds of bloodied fist meeting bloodied bone and flesh, the grin on Cain's face afterward. She wanted to wipe her memory clean of that day but no matter how safe she felt wrapped in Cain's embrace she could never forget the look on his face that night. He had scared her. An event she would have never thought possible before then. The nightmares that plagued her when she slept were a result of Cain's misunderstanding- he thought her father, Owen, had taken advantage of her, forced himself on her, abused her. He hadn't. He had never done anything she hadn't wanted. She knew that Cain's experience with the rape and death of his best friend's sister had tainted his mind and tinted his view of the world, so she understood. She had differentiated the two images of her father in her mind. Her daddy, the one who loved her, and the one that she loved. And Owen, the one who hurt her in her dreams, the only one that Cain saw.

She hadn't noticed- due to how wrapped up in her thoughts she was- but Cain had gone rigid with the mention of their mother. Now he had sat down in a chair in the room and was flipping through her offers, looking displeased.

"I don't particularly like that you have to be in a completely different country either." He said, gruffly, as if he didn't really want to admit that fact.

Setsuka broke away from her thoughts and looked at him expectantly.

"I'll think about it. Especially now that I've got all of these offers here." He sighed and shuffled through his own papers, before setting them back down in a tired huff.

Setsuka couldn't help but smirk a little at the sight. He wasn't going to be openly excited about them but she could tell he was pleased. Accepting the role in the first place had been a monumental addition to his career and a large step out of his comfort zone. Now that all that effort was actually paying off she couldn't help but want to bask in the success for him.

A sudden wave of sleepiness hit her and she let out a large yawn, stretching her arms above her head. Her top slid further up revealing a few more inches of the creamy white skin underneath. Oblivious, Setsuka turned her attention back to Cain who been silent for a while only to find him already staring at her.

She smirked at the attention, and they held eye contact for a moment.

"We should get a drink to celebrate."

Cain frowned. "What?"

Setsuka was grinning now. "A drink. You know, some alcohol to celebrate your success." Cain's frown quickly deepened into a scowl.

"You are way too young to be casually drinking alcohol." Setsuka rolled her eyes.

"It's not like it's illegal. Or like I haven't before. I just want to celebrate this with you…" She pouted.

Her eyes looked up at him through her lashes, lower lip jutting out slightly. It was a known weakness of his. And just as it had many times in the past, was a flawless way to get what she wanted.

Cain sighed, frustratedly running a hand through his hair.

"Fine. One drink."

"That's all I'm asking for." Setsuka retorted with a wide smile on her face.

Cain narrowed his eyes at her. "And when we get back you're going straight to bed. You need to get some rest."

Setsu waved him off as she began reapplying some lipstick and straightening out her clothes.

"Yeah, yeah. I will."

"I mean it." Cain emphasized, tossing his coat her way. As if she was going to get away with wearing that to a bar.

Setsu shrugged it on without complaint, it was pretty cold out at this time of night anyways. She took his hand in hers as they exited the hotel room.

"Let's go celebrate Nii-san's success!"

Cain was in a terrible mood. Worse than usual, that is. If someone had told him in advance that the LME company wanted to meet with him as soon as possible as in this morning at 8 o'clock in the middle of Tokyo he would not have agreed to go out drinking with his little sister last night and he definitely not have returned to the hotel well past four in the morning.

He had only received the call from Director Konoe after both his and Setsuka's phones had been ringing nonstop this morning and in a flash of rage he had picked up and was fully prepared to send the person calling to the 9th circle of Hell. Unfortunately, Director Konoe was a fast talker and managed to get out the important information that drew Cain's attention before he could manage to do that.

He had hurriedly been told the address and on top of not knowing if it was correct or not he also had no idea how to get to it. He could have woken Setsu up but she really needed to rest especially after the several drinks she had had the previous night. The thought of her waking up with a hangover due to his inability to say no to her was pissing him off to an extreme level and so he had reluctantly let her sleep, leaving a note for her about his whereabouts in the kitchen.

Now, hours later and well past the original meeting time he was waiting on a bench near a weird statue at Shibuya station for some member of the company to come and collect him. He had been waiting so long he was seriously beginning to doubt that he had the right location and the constant stares and whispers of people walking past him was doing absolutely nothing to help his ruined mood.

He honestly didn't even know who was supposed to be collecting him. They had mentioned a girl but if he had gotten some description maybe he would have recognized her if she had passed by him already. He let out a frustrated sigh and dug into his pocket for a mangled pack of cigarettes. Setsu had curbed his smoking habits quite a bit in the last few years, she hadn't liked when he smoked in the first place- constantly lecturing him about how unhealthy it was. But after they had left whenever he smoked in front of her she begged him to have a drag until eventually he had just given her one for herself. Though, ironically, he hated to encourage her in his own bad and unhealthy habits and tried to stop smoking in front of her completely. But at times like these, when he was alone and agitated, he couldn't resist the sweet lure of nicotine.

He stuck one into his mouth and dug around in his coat pockets some more for a lighter, producing the one that Setsu had bought for him a few months ago with the queen of hearts on it. It had been a present for him finishing filming and as he shook it he realized it was nearly empty. His scowl deepened even further and he lit the cigarette hanging on his lips, shoving the lighter back into his pocket.

Setsu was alone when she awoke in the morning. She had a headache that was bordering on being a migraine. And why shouldn't she? She had way more than a single drink last night and only fell asleep due to extreme exhaustion at five in the morning.

She reached over and picked up her phone, which was blinking angrily with missed calls. She looked at the time- 13:38pm. She had only slept for six hours. Great.

Rubbing her eyes sleepily, she opened her missed calls wondering if her Nii-san had been trying to reach her. Instead she saw Konoe's name multiple times along with a few other numbers she didn't recognize. Frowning, she clutched her phone in her hand as she crawled out of bed.

A wave of dizziness hit her as she stood up and she stayed perfectly still for a moment to let her head adjust. Once the room stopped spinning she walked on heavy feet into the kitchen, hoping to find something to eat to soothe her rumbling stomach but her eyes were drawn to a piece of paper sitting on the counter.

Curious she picked it up, immediately recognizing her brother's handwriting.

Morning.

If you have a headache there's some pain medication over by the nightstand.

I got called in to a meeting with the LME acting department, they want to represent me.

Call you when I get out.

-Cain

So that's where he ran off to. Setsu set the note back down and dug around in the refrigerator until she found some leftovers from a few nights before and deemed it edible enough to eat.

She fished a fork out of a drawer and ate for a few minutes before turning her attention to her phone.

As she picked it up it buzzed with a message, startling her.

A text from one of her classmates wondering where she's been.

She scowled. It had been at least a week since she'd last been to school and sooner or later Cain was likely going to send her back. Which meant she was going to need to hurry up convincing him that she should go to school here.

She closed out of the message and began a call to Konoe. Even if Cain wasn't thrilled about her doing it she was actually looking forward to trying out acting. If it was something she liked, her and Cain would have more common ground to work off of and she wouldn't have to keep sitting on the sidelines as she watched him climb up the metaphorical ladder of his career. But the view was great. It was so great. But for once she just wanted to be on equal ground with him and not worry about him slowly slipping out of her grasp again.

"Setsuka-chan?" The expectant voice coming from the phone caught her attention, bringing her out of her thoughts.

"What do you want?" She couldn't help the slight irritation that seeped into her voice. She really wasn't a fan of talking to people right after she woke up. Unless it was her brother of course.

Konoe seemed slightly taken aback by her brusqueness but continued nonetheless. "Uh… yes, well, good afternoon. Apologies for bothering the two of you so much this morning. But I can't get into contact with your brother and I… fear what will happen to me if I bother him again." Setsu almost laughed at the genuine fear in his voice. Her nii-san wasn't a morning person as it was, she could only imagine how irritated he had been when he was forced to get out of bed so early in the morning.

"I also apologize that I'm the one that has to keep calling the two of you about these matters. Hopefully Heel-san gets a contract with LME today and they can assign someone to represent both of you."

Setsuka nibbled on her food some more, barely listening to Konoe's rambling. He had yet to get to the point and that was beginning to get on her nerves.

"In any event, one of the artists I mentioned that was interested in you being in their music video has just informed me that they are on a very tight schedule and are only going to be in Japan until tomorrow evening."

"So, they were asking if it would be alright to meet with you today? I know it's sudden but I can't really help these things or negotiate because, again, I'm not representing you and I am not part of an agency. But I really think this is a great opportunity and it would be a shame if you were to miss it."

She sighed. Cain had said that he'd think about her living here with him but he hadn't said anything else about the acting jobs. But… she didn't have to say yes right away. She just had to meet with them. What was the harm in that?

"When did they want to meet with me?" She asked, fiddling around with her lip ring nervously.

"They said that 3pm today would be ideal."

Setsuka rose from her chair, bringing the now empty container over to the sink.

"Okay."

Konoe paused, confused by her vague answer.

"Does that work for you? Should I tell them you'll be there?"

"... Yes. I'll be there." She just hoped Cain wouldn't be too upset with her for going without telling him.

"Excellent! So for convenience, they'd like you to meet them at their agency Akatoki. I can give you the directions if you'd like."

"Not necessary." She replied coldly, dreading talking to this man for another moment. "Who is it that I'm going to meet?"

"That would be Sho Fuwa. Very popular. I believe he's preparing for a tour right now."

"Sho Fuwa." She echoed.

Somehow the name tasted bitter on her tongue.

The majority of Cain's cigarettes lay on the ground beneath him, crunched and squashed. He brutally grinded the cigarette in his mouth with his teeth, spitting it down at the ground and then crushing it belligerently with his boot, adding to the pile. The terrified civilians around him were keeping extra distance from him but he could still feel their gazes on him igniting his anger even further.

2 hours. He had been sitting here for two hours. He had tried to call Konoe to ask him what the hell the holdup was but his calls had been going straight to voicemail. Which only pissed him off further. He had crunched his cigarette a little after an hour of waiting, completely on accident, when he had been unconsciously clenching his jaw and grinding his teeth to alleviate some of the pent up aggression rising up inside of him. Now he had gone through most of the pack and if he ran out he didn't know what would happen and he really wasn't looking to get arrested. Setsu needed him.

Out of the corner of his eye a shade of pink infuriatingly bright and eye-catching kept flashing in and out of his vision. Currently that was annoying him the most. Japanese people dressed relatively modestly so who the fuck was walking around in bright ass pink?

After a moment of seeing the flashing color he could clearly see it, and whoever was wearing it, a good distance away and getting closer. He crunched the cigarette violently, spitting it to the ground and throwing all his weight into stomping it out to discourage whoever it was trying to approach him.

The movement stopped and, satisfied, Cain pulled out the last remaining cigarette, sticking it between his lips and crushing the package in his hand as he put it back into his pocket. His fished out the lighter again and had to vigorously flick the switch until it sputtered and shot out a small flame just enough to light the cigarette up. Fresh annoyance flashed through him now that it was empty and he stuck it back into his pocket defeatedly.

Although, much to his immediate annoyance, the figure in the agonizingly bright pink had started to approach him again. Cain kept his glare to the ground as they came to a stop right beside him. He glanced upwards, expressing his disdain freely in his facial expression, and was suddenly looking into the shocked face of a short haired brunette girl.

"Ts…Tsuru...ga?" She nearly whispered, not an ounce of anything but stupefied wonder in her eyes.

Cain could hear people around them begin to murmur anxiously.

"Tsuruga-san… it's you isn't it?" The girl asked, leaning in closer. She was speaking Japanese but he could still understand what she was saying since it was spoken so formally. Cain narrowed his eyes at her, and she pulled back in surprise. Her expression quickly morphing from surprise to stunned horror as she slowly backed away. He didn't know who this Tsuruga-san was but she seemed to realize that she had mistaken him for someone else.

Just looking at her in all that blinding pink irked his nerves even more and he couldn't help but crunch down on the cigarette in his mouth, spitting it out towards her feet and then squashing it under his boot with his violent glare trained on her.

He stood then, completely fed up with all of this waiting, swaying intimidatingly close to her as a final warning. She lost her balance then, staring up at him in complete and utter fear and a surge of adrenaline coursed through his blood at the thrill of knowing he caused that. He lifted a foot as if he was going to step on her, and had a half a mind to do so, but she cowered and shielded her head as if believing he was actually going to do it. He fought off the rush that gave him, not having seen anyone tremble in complete fear of him in so long, and simply stepped over her. He was going to stop to get something to eat and then head home. These people had wasted enough of his time.

Besides he had run out of cigarettes and lighter fluid. He wasn't sure what he would do if he suffered anymore annoyances.

He had been walking for a good twenty minutes before he heard dashing footsteps behind him, sounding like someone was running for their very life. He turned, grimaced when he saw the ball of pink hurtling towards him and stopped in his place. The girl skidded to a stop in front of him and doubled over as she attempted to catch her breath.

"What the hell do you want?" He snapped, not even bothering to attempt to speak in Japanese. His patience had long been tossed out of the window.

Her head snapped up at his voice and she had that shocked look on her face again.

"Are…" She began in English, stopping only to catch her breath. "Are you by any chance Mr. Cain Heel?" Cain was taken aback by her fluency in English, and lifted an eyebrow skeptically.

"Yes. Why?"

She looked relieved for an instant and then vigorously lifted her torso up and then down repeatedly, bowing in that respectful way people here tended to do.

"I am so sorry! For my tardiness especially! The president didn't tell me that he changed the location I was picking you up from- oh but of course, a president's fault is also his subordinate's fault so I am very truly sorry! And then I thought you were a coworker of mine because you look so much like him! Your measurements are almost exactly the same! You're physically the same person! But of course you aren't Tsuruga-san that was stupid of me, he's much more…" She trailed off as she caught the look on Cain's face and straightened.

"My deepest apologies. I'm Kyoko Mogami from the Talent Agency at LME. I've been sent to get you. And please pardon my offensive attire, I'm also part of the LoveMe program which requires us to wear these ridiculous outfits."

Cain felt the glare leave his face without his permission. Something about this girl, Kyoko, reminded him of Setsu when she was younger making his heart swell with nostalgia.

He sighed, rolling his eyes. She had been late but at least she had come and even chased him down after he left. He had give her some credit.

But what the hell was the LoveMe program and who on Earth was cruel enough to make her wear such a visually irritating outfit?

"Let's get going. Enough time has been wasted." He growled out.

Kyoko bowed a few more times and then began walking back in the direction they had just come from.

Apparently Japanese people in show business didn't know the definition of modest.

When Kyoko had led him to the office of the LME president, of course only after they had run into some friend of hers in the lobby donning the same ridiculous outfit and she had gone completely frantic yelling something about "Moko-san" -he would need to ask Setsu what the hell that meant- and then rambled on and on about her, a rush of women dressed in gold dresses with heavy eyeliner had strutted in, posing in various places in the room followed by bronze colored men wearing nothing but cloths around their waists holding a sphinx statue over their heads with a man perching on it.

The dramatic music that had begun when they entered slowly faded out as the men lowered the statue and the lost pharaoh of Egypt down to the ground.

The man stepped off the sphinx, raised his hands high above his head and announced himself to be Lory Takarada, president of LME.

Cain was almost impressed.

Almost.

Now that the theatrics had calmed down and most of the extras had slinked out of the room save for one man that stayed stationed at the door now it was just the president, Kyoko, and himself.

"I don't speak English very well so Kyoko-chan here will be translating for me." The president announced.

Kyoko looked between them nervously, obviously still unsettled with his presence.

Cain was glad for the translation though, his head was beginning to hurt from trying to understand what everyone was saying around him all the time. Normally it wouldn't be that much of a problem he hardly listened unless he was being directly spoken to but he was exhausted and couldn't focus well enough.

"To begin with, I'm very happy that you decided to meet with us today." Kyoko echoed in english at Lory's nod towards her.

"You were absolutely spectacular in the role of B.J in Tragic Marker. For a character that didn't talk at all I was very impressed by how you handled the character. Of course I also heard there was a bit of an issue on set with one of your co-workers but sometimes actors stay in character even when not filming. The final result was amazing and that's all that matters at the end of the day."

"We would like to extend an open contract with you, which would mean that we would allow you to also be contracted to an agency in an English speaking country. We would supply you with a manager as I'm sure you've gotten tons of offers by now and we'd even like to extend an offer to you right away."

"A good friend of mine. A director named Hiroaki Ogata made a name for himself by reimagining the popular drama Tsukigomori into Dark Moon." Kyoko looked vaguely surprised by the mention of it which Lory noticed.

He grinned at her. "A production that our wonderful Kyoko herself starred in." He said himself. Kyoko blushed lightly and smiled seemingly despite herself.

"Anyways, Ogata-san is working on a remake of another movie called My Shadow. It's about a man who is being stalked by his look alike and he must face the identity crisis when his evil double begins to take over his life. Ren Tsuruga has already accepted the role of the main character and Ogata-san has been scrambling to find an actor that even looks remotely similar to him. Height being the main issue there."

Tsuruga. Cain noticed the name sounded familiar. It was what Kyoko had called him when they initially met.

"Kyoko, what do you think?"

The brunette looked analytically at Cain once again and nodded.

"Almost the same exact measurements. His posture is completely different though and he's just slightly taller. But he could be Tsuruga-san's twin no doubt about that."

"Yes, that's exactly what I thought. There couldn't be a better fit for the role." Lory agreed, then turned his attention back to Cain.

"How good is your Japanese?"

He grimaced. "I can understand it better than I'll ever hope to speak it."

Lory leaned back in his chair and grasped his chin in thought. "Have you had many roles that required you to speak?"

Cain shrugged. "Not really."

"Hmm, well you can look at the script and see if you feel like you can do it. In the meantime, are you thinking that you'd like to sign with us today?"

He had wasted way too much time today to not at least get something out of it. Plus Setsu would be happy if it also came with a big role with whoever this… Tsuruga guy was.

"Yes. I am."

Several hours later, Cain was walking out of the LME office with an acting contract, first choice in a very big role, and promises of a manager whenever they figured out who would be suited to him, namely a translator.

He was feeling particularly pleased with himself at that accomplishment and couldn't wait to share the news with Setsu. He slipped his phone out of his pocket, clicking into her contact and held the phone up to his ear as it began to ring.

… and ring.

… and ring.

"Hi this is Setsuka Heel, if I didn't answer you I probably don't care so please don't call back!"

Cain frowned as the cheery voice of her voicemail spoke into his ear. He didn't bother leaving a message, if she saw that it was him she'd call back as soon as she saw it.

She couldn't still be sleeping, right? Cain checked the time. 15:57. Surely she couldn't have slept for ten hours.

But she was really tired…

Frustrated, he sent her a text message instead.

Out of my meeting. Went well. Are you still sleeping?

He waited for a moment, just about to give up and put his phone away when it buzzed with a response.

Not at home! Dont b mad, I went to c abt one of my offers. Hes a prick tho. Gonna leave soon

Nii-san?

Don't be mad ok?

Cain blinked down at his screen. Once. Twice. Read over the messages again in case he had read incorrectly.

Who

Don't b mad! Sho Fuwa. He's a dick tho, srsly I'm leaving now !

He shouldn't be mad. There was no reason for him to be. She was allowed to find her own path, to do what she wanted. He should be letting her. God, he should let her do whatever she wanted for the rest of her life because he knew what she had been through, what he himself had caused. How broken she was. But he was mad. Livid. And the most confusing thing was that he wasn't sure if he was mad at her for not discussing this with him first, or at himself for actually feeling a surge of jealousy.

What was there to even be jealous about?

This took SO much longer than it should have, sorry about that. Hopefully updates will be a little more frequent now that things have calmed down. Thank you all so incredibly much for the support on the first chapter it's crazy! Hope you enjoyed this chapter just as much! Cain acting with Ren!? Setsu meeting Sho?! Kyoko meeting Cain in a way that's very similar to the manga (ch. 152-153)?! I'm so excited for the rest of this story! Hope you guys are too! See you all again soon, hopefully!