4

It had been a few days since the twins ran into Michiru Kita again. Despite seeing the ring around her neck, the twins managed to snap out of their shock long enough to be introduced to the two boys that were with her. However, they didn't stay out of their shock long enough to remember them properly.

Lin was currently laying on his bed, staring up at the ceiling in thought. Ever since the twins reunited with Michiru, Lin had been seeing the same dream over and over again, to the point that he could remember every single detail of it. He was currently replaying the death scene within his mind as Rin came into his room.

"You ready to go zombie hunting, Lin?" Rin asked as she walked up to Lin's bedside. "It's almost time."

"Huh?" Lin said, snapping out of his thoughts. He blinked a few times before looking towards his twin sister. "What did you say, Rin? I was too busy thinking about something."

"You were thinking about that silly dream you've been having, right?" Rin said, putting her hands on her hips and looked at her twin brother sternly. "You've been doing that a lot lately."

"Can you blame me?" Lin asked, "I can't help it, especially after we-"

"You know as well as I do that reaping people we've met is part of the job." Rin said as she climbed up onto his bed and sat on the edge. "We even got to reap Momma once we're old enough…."

"Don't remind me," Lin said, turning onto his side.

The two sat in silence for a while before Rin looked over at him.

"I came in here to see if you were up for zombie hunting today," she said, "We still have that high paying zombie to find. And I wanna get it before those stupid Z-Loan guys do!"

She jumped off the bed, turned around and put her hands on her hips. Lin turned around and saw Rin's angry face glaring at him. He knew that no matter what he would say, there was no way of getting out of this one. With a sigh of defeat, Lin, too, got off the bed and went over to his sister.

"So, what's the plan for tonight?" Lin asked.

Rin quickly made her angry face disappear and replaced it with a huge grin. "Tonight we're going to explore inside the school~!" she said.

Lin stared at her with wide eyes before screaming. "Ehhh?!"

"W-w-why d-d-do we h-h-have to e-e-explore the inside to-to-tonight?" Lin asked as he followed Rin through the dark halls of Kokuba Academy, shaking like a leaf.

"Because we already explored the outside of the school!" Rin said. "So it makes sense to explore the inside now!"

"C-c-couldn't we have done it at another time?" Lin asked, looking like he was on the brink of tears. "L-l-like on a Sunday?"

Rin let out a sigh and stopped in her tracks, making Lin stop as well. She spun around on her heel and put her hands on her hips, looking at her twin sternly.

"You're supposed to be the star candidate for the next Shinigami, Lin." Rin said, "You're not supposed to be scared of the dark!"

"I'm not scared of the dark!" Lin exclaimed. "I-I-I just prefer to hunt my enemies out in the open is all. Like out in the courtyard!"

"You suck at lying," Rin said, huffing slightly before turning back around. "But fine, stick close to me then….baby."

"I'm not a baby!" Lin said as he and Rin continued down the hall.

"Right, and I'm the tooth fairy." Rin said. "Just make sure not to run off on me."

"I could say the same to you," Lin said, pouting at his sister.

A few long moments of silence passed before something came up behind Lin and grabbed his shoulder, making him let out an ear splitting scream. Rin quickly covered her ears to this before turning to look at him.

"What in the world-?!" Rin started but cut herself off. "Hey! What's the astral thingy doing here?!"

"H-h-h-huh?!" Lin asked once he stopped screaming.

He looked toward his shoulder to see a pale ghost-like hand holding onto it. This didn't help with the volume of his scream.

"Can it will you?!" Rin said, slapping Lin upside the head. "This just means we're close to the plushie money-I mean, the high paying zombie!" Rin let out a giggle as she went behind Lin. "Hold still."

Lin nodded his head as Rin raised a hand into the air. Within the next moment, a sword appeared out of thin air with a cat charm on the hilt. Rin grabbed hold of it before bringing it down to the floor, cutting the hand from its source.

"Looks like this zombie will be a really juicy pay, Lin!" Rin said as she turned around to find more hands coming out of the ground. "Maybe I can go plushie shopping with Momma on Sunday! Wouldn't that be fun, Lin?"

She turned her head to look at Lin but found an empty space of where he once stood. She blinked a few times and looked around the hall some.

"Lin?"