A/N: I've always had two potential endings for this story in mind - both (I think, anyway) were equally good, but very different. During my initial planning and outlining, I decided on Ending #1. However, after setting the story aside for so long, then coming back to it with fresh eyes…I really think Ending #2 is the way to go. This doesn't change anything I've written already, except that it means I should have brought Hei's POV in much sooner, and I have about 15 Hei chapters that I wasn't planning on writing that now, well, I have to write for his story arc to make any sense. And some of them take place during Misaki chapters that I've already posted. Whoops.
AO3 lets me rearrange chapters easily, so I will be slipping the new chapters in where they belong there. FFN, however, is not so accommodating. If you're reading on that site, the new chapters will be tacked on after the previously published chapter, and you'll have to take a look at the dates to see where they fit in with Misaki's timeline. Not ideal, but it's the best I can do!
A/N the 2nd: I've mentioned before how I don't regard S2 as canon for any of my stories; that mostly goes for the gaiden episodes as well, though I did like the gaiden in general - with the exception of the whole Izunami subplot. So as we dive into Hei's POV, you will see things are straight-up out of the gaiden or at least inspired by it; but no Izunami. Because that was dumb.
April 7, 2008: East China Sea
It was pitch black in the cargo area of the small SUV. Hei didn't mind the darkness; he'd never minded darkness. But the heavy blanket that was hiding them from casual view did too good a job of muffling sound, and it was setting him on edge.
Moreso than he already was.
The low growl of an engine turning over came from the car next to them, and Hei gripped the hilt of his knife even more tightly, ignoring the cramp that was beginning to ache in his left calf muscle.
After a brief moment, the sound faded into the general distant, echoing noises in the belly of the ro-ro as the car pulled away. Hei didn't loosen his grip at all; their car was likely next.
He and Yin had spent hours hidden in the used SUV. It was hot and cramped, but with the protective opaque plastic covering the windows it was safe. As safe as any hiding place on the roll-on/roll-off car carrier ship was likely to be, anyway.
Yin was curled tightly at his back, her faint, even breathing no indication of whether she was awake or not. Hei hoped not, for her sake. Aside from the general discomfort of the car, she needed to rest and recover from her exhaustion of the past week.
When they'd first begun working together in Tokyo, she had needed exactly eight hours of sleep for every twenty-four. It didn't have to be a continuous eight hours, or even during the nighttime; Huang had mentioned once that he had to take care scheduling some of their ops to be sure that Yin's programming wouldn't force her to essentially shut down until she'd gotten her mandated sleep.
She had some trouble with that still, though it was becoming less and less of a problem the longer they were on the run together. Hei didn't know if it was simply that her programming was wearing off - that happened, he knew, especially with the more complex packages, and he had no idea when her last update had been (Yin might know; he hadn't asked) - or if she was becoming better at exerting her own self-control. He tended to think it was the latter.
The first couple of weeks as they'd fled across the Ryukyu Islands from Kagoshima, Hei would notice her eyes start to droop in the middle of a meal or as soon as they'd sat down on a ferry. Once, she had woken him early into her watch; they'd been moving for the past eighteen hours straight and she could no longer fight her programming to keep her eyes open.
It was a liability; Hei couldn't deny that. But it was one that was only too familiar.
There hadn't been a need for constant watches during their eleven days on the ro-ro. Hei had chosen this ship simply because they'd needed a way out of Okinawa. The islands were too small, too isolated; strangers like them, strangers as strange as them, stood out - and a ship at sea with little to no opportunity for the Syndicate's contractors to cross their path had been the ideal choice. He'd asked around at the various waterfront bars until he'd found a captain with a vacancy for an assistant cook and without a need to ask questions - or for legal documentation.
It had seemed perfect; but as soon as the ship shoved off, Yin had been stricken with a severe case of seasickness, barely able to leave their tiny cabin for the entire duration of the voyage.
Hei hadn't even known dolls could get seasick; and Yin of all people. The only thing that helped - albeit only a little - was sending her specter out into the blue depths below the keel. She couldn't split her mind like that indefinitely however, not without exhausting herself even worse than the constant nausea was doing already. The ship had finally docked this morning, and it hadn't been too soon.
"Are you sure you can't stay on for the next leg?" Taro, the first mate, had asked as he'd shown Hei the SUV that he promised wouldn't be chosen as part of Customs' randomized inspection.
The captain and crew of twenty had all taken to Hei's young couple on the run from a powerful, disapproving family story immediately; Yin's soft quietness and unfortunate illness had only endeared her to them further. And the ease with which both Taro and the captain had accepted Hei's request for an unobtrusive way off the ship told him that smuggling - human or otherwise - was an old familiar game for them.
"Customs may not check every single car, but you won't make it far in Shanghai without papers. And Cap'n doesn't mind paying under the table. Not for donburi like you make it, anyway!"
Hei shook his head, smiling his Li smile. "Thanks, but we have a friend in the city who can help out," he lied.
In fact, he would have considered staying - if not for Yin, and if not for the fact that shipping itineraries weren't exactly hard to find. A contractor who found out what ship they were on could simply wait for them in port. Or, if he or she was particularly impatient, track them down at sea where there was little chance of escape. A hit disguised as simple piracy would be fairly easy to pull off, with enough crew.
The Syndicate had considered it for Hei once, for a target that had been particularly hard to pin down in Indonesia; but he hadn't been willing to work with a dozen other criminals to make it happen. It was the only assignment he'd ever flat out refused. The Syndicate wisely reevaluated the mission when they realized that all the pirates turning up dead in addition to the ship's crew would only draw unwelcome scrutiny to the passenger list.
"We'll be fine as long as we can get off the ship without being seen," Hei assured Taro.
"Well, you and your girl be careful out there. I don't know what to believe about all this contractor stuff they're talking about on TV, but if any of it's true, who knows how safe it is anymore."
"If any of it's true, it's been true for the past ten years," Hei said mildly, ignoring a fresh stab in his gut.
"Yeah, well, I don't know I believe any of that PR bullshit that lady cop has been saying; what could a woman know about dangerous psychos like those anyway."
The television in the mess hall was on twenty-four-seven, and the national news channel replayed portions of Misaki's press conference from the morning after the Tokyo Explosion several times a day. Hei had quickly run out of excuses to leave the room whenever it came on; he could look away, but the sound of her voice berating reporters for interrupting her sent a knife of pain through his gut every time he heard it.
The other man shook his head, but passed Hei the cash that was his payment for the past eleven days and helped an unsteady Yin climb into the back of the SUV.
The car bumped slightly, dialing Hei's focus into the faintest sounds filtering through the blanket. It sounded like…yes, the straps securing the wheels to the cargo deck were being detached. A bead of sweat rolled down his neck; he didn't move to wipe it away.
He hardly dared to breathe as the car door opened and someone climbed in. Hei trusted Taro, to the extent that he'd trust any smuggler; but none of the other crew knew exactly how Hei and Yin were getting off the ship and he wanted to keep it that way. At least the inspection seemed to have passed them by, as promised.
If the driver thought to glance into the back of the car, however, he must not have noticed anything amiss, for the engine turned over and the car started forward. A minor jolt indicated that they'd reached the stern quarter ramp, and the echoes of the metal cargo decks were replaced by the raucous calls of seabirds.
Yin flinched the tiniest bit at the bumps, but she knew better than to make a sound.
A minute or two was all it took for the SUV to be driven off the ship and parked in what Hei could only assume was the dockside lot along with all the other cars from the hold. He forcefully steadied his breathing, desperate to take a quick look and ensure that they hadn't been taken anywhere else yet knowing that such a look was too risky.
It had only been two minutes. They couldn't have been taken anywhere dangerous. If there was a contractor waiting, they would continue to wait until dark. That would be the rational move.
Hei's internal clock judged that it was mid-afternoon, but no light penetrated through the window coverings and blanket. Beside him, Yin let out a quiet sigh. It sounded like relief; perhaps she could tell they were back on solid ground. He wanted to ask if she was okay; the heat was uncomfortable, and she was already dehydrated. The two bottles of water that Taro had given them would need to be saved for later.
The minutes continued to tick by, bleeding into hours. Tiredness was dragging at Hei's eyes, but despite that he couldn't see a thing anyway, he didn't dare close them. Closing them might lead him to nod off, which might lead to a fatally slowed reaction time. He couldn't let his guard down.
The first contractor had caught up with them on Yakushima Island, two days after they'd left mainland Japan. His guard had been down, then.
He hadn't expected anyone to find them so early; there hadn't been a single sign that they'd been picked up leaving Tokyo. He and Yin had made their way to the quieter, southern side of the island, where Yin located a deserted fisherman's shack just outside of town.
It was an ideal spot to stop and catch their breath after their headlong flight across the country to Kagoshima. Yin was enamored with the ocean, spending hours at a time with her feet at the edge of the surf, a faint almost-smile teasing at the corners of her lips.
They were isolated here, yet close enough to town that Hei could run in for supplies; maybe after a month or two he could get a job at one of the little restaurants.
They weren't that far from Tokyo still; maybe things would settle down faster than he expected. Maybe he was overestimating the Syndicate's desire and ability to see him dead. They'd lost, after all, and Misaki was openly on their trail now. It was only a matter of time before she had the entire organization hamstrung; once they gave up hunting him, he could go back and help her.
He was standing at the top of the beach, watching Yin's back wistfully, his mind far away (fifteen hundred kilometers away, wondering how Misaki was coping with the mess he'd left behind for her and forcing himself to not think about what would have happened if he'd stopped that evening when he'd heard her calling his name; if he'd stayed). The only warning that he got was a slight tilt of Yin's head in his direction.
It was only then that he registered the sound that he should have heard immediately: a soft shifting of the sand. He turned just in time to see a violent wave of golden sand rippling straight at him.
He threw himself to the side, the edge of the wave just catching the hem of his jeans at the ankle and tearing an inch-wide gash through the denim.
A knife was in his hand before the thought had even formed in his mind. Not one of his good, double-bladed knives, but a still-decent throwing blade that was small enough to conceal at the small of his back.
Crouching behind a pile of driftwood, he peered out, searching for his target; another wave of sand cut right through the center of the bleached wood.
He'd heard the wave coming this time, was expecting it, and even as the shredding force of the tiny grains hit the wood he was already dashing across the open beach to the dense stand of trees that was sheltering the contractor. A crash of undergrowth gave away her flight from her hiding place.
Ouro; they'd worked together briefly in South America. She had no chance in the trees, and she knew it.
"Hei, wait!" she called back, dodging around trunks without looking back to see if he was listening. "It's nothing personal - the Syndicate - you should have known they'd put a price on your head!"
Hei was surprised that she'd taken the assignment; she ought to know she wasn't a match for him, hadn't been even when he was still human.
"We can - we can make a deal!" She turned just long enough to send another wave - sandy soil, this time - ripping through the undergrowth, but Hei simply dodged and it hit a tree instead.
Ouro stumbled then, not enough to fall, but it broke her stride and that was all the time that Hei needed. He threw. The knife buried itself hilt-deep just to the right of her fifth thoracic vertebrae.
Hei approached the prone body cautiously. She was dressed like a tourist, in chinos and a polo, her skin still as golden tan as he remembered. She didn't move when he withdrew the knife, but a gurgle of air escaped her lungs. He rolled her over.
"Make it qui-" she managed to wheeze before he sliced her throat open. Blood so dark in the shadows of the trees that it was almost black gushed onto the earth.
Electric shock would have been faster, but he couldn't risk the ping from his star.
As far as contractors went, he'd almost liked her. Almost.
Yin was picking herself up out of the surf when he got back to the beach, her dress soaked through. Hei was glad that she'd remembered what he'd told her the very first day: If you can run, run; if you can't run, hide. If there's no place to hide, then throw yourself flat on the ground and don't move.
"Are you alright?" he asked, his heart still thudding hollowly in his chest. When she nodded, he bent to rinse his blade in the water. The adrenaline was always slow to subside, yet he hadn't felt it this strongly for this long since Heaven's War.
"I saw her," Yin said quietly, the surf rushing away from her bare feet. "With my specter. I couldn't say anything fast enough."
"You didn't need to."
She was silent for a long moment; then she said, "We have to leave?"
"Yeah. I'm sorry."
They stopped at the shack long enough to collect their gear and for Yin to change her clothes, then they headed to town and were on the first ferry out.
Hei killed two more contractors on two more islands before he found them berths on the ro-ro.
"The moon is up," Yin said softly.
Hei blinked, startled back into the present. Had he nodded off after all? Inwardly cursing his carelessness, he asked, "Is it dark?"
He didn't bother asking how Yin knew the moon had risen, when no one had seen it for over ten years. It was still there, for all that the sky had changed in their feeble human perception.
"Yes. Two hours past midnight."
Damn, he had fallen asleep. "We have to be sure it's safe before we can move."
They waited another long hour, Yin keeping watch with handfuls of water from their two bottles, until Hei was reasonably satisfied that there was no one lying in wait for them. He opened the hatch door cautiously, only about two feet, then slid through the gap to the asphalt below. Yin dropped easily into his waiting arms. Pausing only long enough for him to sling his light-devouring jacket over his shoulders, they crept across the parking lot, full of cars but not a single person at this time of night.
Taro had told him about a gap in the chain link perimeter fence, large enough for a slender person to slip through. It was there; Hei and Yin slipped through.
Taro had also told him about a bar down the street to the left, where he might find a few people sympathetic to his story.
Hei turned them right. He trusted Taro; but only to the extent that he'd trust any smuggler.