Thank you for reading and showing interest! Author's notes will be at the bottom, but theyaren't much on account that I didn't have time to write much at the end of this chapter.

Thank you, and please enjoy.

Considering that they were in the middle of summer, one would have assumed that Kaneki and Hide would have been wearing light clothing as they made their way through what they thought to be the inner downtown streets of the 20th Ward. Even though it was dark outside, it was still July, and thus should have been short-sleeve weather. However, due to the fact that the weather had been an anomaly ever since the bombs dropped a little over two years ago, the two young men were needing to wear their fall clothing in order to stay warm beneath the cloudy and overcast skies above Tokyo.

With his hands tucked into the side pockets of his black and yellow jersey sweater, Hide lamented over the information that Kaneki had relayed to him from his doctor visit, and was doing his best to keep his best friend from freaking out by making the results seem far less drastic than they actually were.

"Sooooo… Let me get this straight, my man: What you're telling me is that they FOUND like that? Like, after Kamishiro turned your stomach into hamburger meat-"

"-Hide, seriously?! That's not funny…!" Kaneki interrupted with panicked eyes that glared menacingly back at Hide, who in turn did his best to move on from his poor choice of words without making it more of a big deal than it actually was.

"Right, sorry," Hide apologized quickly, before continuing on with his inquiry. "Anyway, according to your medical records, someone performed some sort of 'Hacksaw-Ridge' surgery on you while you were bleeding out, and transferred Kamishiro's kakuhou into your wound, and then… And then proceeded to stitch you up and leave you there for the EMTs to find you?"

Nodding his head with his stomach feeling like it was doing cartwheels inside of him, Kaneki let out a disgruntled scoff out of disbelief as he and Hide turned the corner of a sidewalk to begin making their way further toward their destination. "That's all hearsay, but the TSC is supposedly still looking into it, but… Yes, it's ridiculous that they didn't tell me sooner about it!"

Nodding his head in a far calmer demeanor than Kaneki, Hide added, "No kidding, huh? And what was their excuse for not telling you again?"

"… They said that they were already dealing with an influx of patients from some botched mercenary or peacekeeper operation," Kaneki said with his sense of anger becoming more transparent as he talked more about what he had experienced. "It's total bullshit, pardon my language, but, like… I'm mad, Hide! The worst part of it is that they knew about it, and performed ANOTHER surgery on me without my permission…"

"That 'qunix' surgery, right? But, uh… Sort of like a reverse 'quinx' surgery, huh?" Hide mused with a slight bit of curiosity in his voice, as he thought more and more about why they performed such a thing on his best friend, until it hit him. "You know, they probably tried on you because they figured you were a lost cause…"

Outraged and caught off guard by what Hide had said, Kaneki came to a stand still before pulling his unsuspecting best friend to the side, until they were underneath a green awning above the front door of some brick and mortar business. "… 'Lost cause'…? What the hell was to mean, Hide?" Kaneki demanded in an angered voice, which caused Hide to immediately take a step back from the emotionally wrecked young man.

"Take it easy, man; I didn't mean it like that!" Hide replied back with his hands raised up in front of his chest, as to signal for his best friend to stand down. "All that I was trying to say was that in their eyes, they're dealing with a lot of patients; some of them are humans who are becoming ghouls from all that red-cloud crap, right?"

Although Kaneki was still trying to calm himself down, his patience was wearing thin. Gritting his teeth while taking in a deep breath, Kaneki collected himself before letting out a slow exhalation of air through his nostrils. "… Okay, and?" Kaneki finally managed to say, while lowering his shoulders down to relax them; much to Hide's silent relief.

"So, from their perspective, they see you as someone without any living family members; no next of kin, no girlfriend, no pets, you name it…" Hide said, while already anticipating the hormonally stressed out young man.

"Hide, what did I-"

"-I'm getting there, alright? Just chill man, alright?" Hide said with a stern yet patient voice, and took a moment to allow Kaneki to once again calm down before continuing on with his hypothesis. "So you were in a coma, probably didn't show signs of recovery and all that jazz… Considering that we live in a messed up world where ethics usually take a backseat to progress, they saw you as the perfect candidate to delve into their own research, and figured that they could possibly save you while conducting their experiments on you…"

"… While I'm not saying what they did was right, far be it. All I'm saying is that I understand WHY they performed a, uh… A 'reversed quinx surgery' on you, but I completely get that they should be held responsible for using you to further their own research, or whatever," Hide clarified, before adding, "And on top of all of that, none of it actually mattered much, because uh… Ya know…" Hide trailed off before chuckling uncomfortably, as he slowly raised a hand up to point a finger at the black armband with two white chevrons that Kaneki was legally obligated to wear out in public. "Because... Because it didn't end up working."

Not particularly feeling all too great about his new circumstances, especially when Hide wasn't exactly making him feel all that much better, Kaneki let out a frustrated groan before pressing his back up against the wooden door of the business they were standing in front of. "Hide… This fucking sucks… I… I don't want to be a damn ghoul…! T-This isn't right; I… I just… UGH!!!" Kaneki shouted through gritted teeth before taking a frustrated swing at the air, to which Hide made sure to steer clear of while his best friend let out his anger in the air.

"I mean… It's all that bad, right?" Hide tried saying with as much optimism as he could muster, which of course caused the already unstable young man to immediately stop swinging at the air so that he could glare bitterly at his blond friend.

"What the actual hell are you talking about, Hide?! Of course it's bad!" Kaneki shouted out with tears of frustration and despair leaking down from the corners of his bloodshot eyes. "I'm a ghoul now, Hide! You know what that means?! It means that I'm sure as HELL not getting back into Kami University, or any FUCKING universities at this point!" Kaneki screamed with his angry tone slowly becoming one of heartbreak and agony.

"Ah shit… K-"

"-No! You don't get to downplay my goddamn tragedies anymore, Hide! NOT THIS TIME!!!" Kaneki screamed defiantly out toward the shocked blond man, who was doing his best to remain calm while passerbyers watched the two uncomfortably, as if though they were a gay couple in the midst of a heated arguement. "You know what I wanted to be?! A professor who taught Kanji, or just Japanese in general! And you know who's not allowed to work directly with humans? Ghouls! That's who!"

Becoming too lost in his own woes while ranting, Kaneki was completely oblivious to the fact that the funny feeling in his left eye wasn't just a twitch, but was his kakugan activating; turning his scarla black with glowing red veins that matched his iris as he glared hatefully at Hide. "My life's fucking over, Hide! I have no future; the only actual ambition I've ever had in life just went down the goddamn drain! I'm going to die in poverty, Hide, and nobody can give two shits about me because I'm just a 'nobody'! W-Why, I-I hope Sasaki finds Kamishiro, because the first thing I'm going to do when I see her is grab her by her shitty dyed hair, and curb stomp her shit-eating grin on the side of the-"

"-Hey! Cut that bullshit out before I beat it out of you, and your dumbass looking friend!" An even more menacing voice belonging to what sounded like a very-overworked young woman demanded, after the owner of the voice slammed opened the wooden door that Kaneki had been leaning on moments ago.

Completely caught off guard and frightened up the tenacity of the young woman with short dark-indigo hair blocking half of her face glaring at him with a black and red of her own, Kaneki immediately lost whatever bravado he had going on just seconds ago, and immediately fell back into his shy and socially-awkward demeanor.

"Oh! Uh, I-I, uh-"

"'I-I-I', I don't give two shits what you gotta say, asshole!" The young woman wearing a black apron over a white dress shirt and bags beneath her exposed kakugan shouted back at Kaneki, after having mocked him for stuttering at her. "You're causing a scene and it's upsetting my customers; people who are actually supporting my business! So either you two dipshits fuck off, or I'm gonna get my family out here, and we're gonna fuck your shit up! Do you understand me, assholes?!"

While Kaneki was at a loss for words, and was completely stunned by how aggressive the ghoul waitress was being with him, Hide couldn't help but to laugh uncomfortably before quietly saying, "Pffft… What the hell did I even do…?" Which, of course, didn't bode too well with the already pissed off ghoul woman.

"Alright, assholes, I guess we're doing this the hard way," the woman said while beginning to roll up her sleeves, before immediately pausing the moment her eye gazed over to notice the lack of any armband around Hide's biceps. "Wait… Hold on… Are you a human?" The woman asked skeptically, as she squinted her eyelid while looking as though she were trying to analyze whether or not Hide was just a ghoul who was trying to hide the fact from the public.

"Uh, yeah? Yeah, we're both h-," Hide cut himself off, before momentarily taking a quick glance at Kaneki, who had lost his kakugan after being scared shitless by the hot-headed woman. "I mean… I'm a human, and my man over here WAS a human, but uh… Yeah, he's what you'd call a 'artificial one-eyed ghoul'," Hide said, hoping that saying that would somehow buy them brownie points with the waitress.

"An 'artificial one-eyed ghoul'…?" The woman muttered under her breath, while beginning to calm down herself as she turned her attention to the young man who had the case of the shaky knees. "Usually you humans only go through those sorts of transitions in order to be better suited for going outside of the walls… But uh, no offense, but… You don't exactly look like the 'harden mercenary' type," the waitress commented while noticing the lack of muscles on Kaneki, before taking note of the sort of clothes he was wearing too. "And, well… You sure as hell don't dress like one who gets paid to be a mercenary either."

Seeing how Kaneki was struggling to respond to the young waitress' comments, Hide decided to step in and be his best friend's voice while he was still trying to regain his composure. "He just started wearing the armband today, but don't let my friend's appearances fool you… He's quite capable, despite his demeanor. Why, he's full of what you'd call 'potential'," Hide said, while trying to sound as though he was making Kaneki seem more impressive than he actually was.

Of course, the waitress was more than skeptical of why the scrawny young man trembling before her was actually capable of. "Yeah, sure, whatever… Look, I have customers who are waiting to get their orders to their tables, and my staff is already drowning in their workload, so… I'm going to go back inside, and assume that you two understand that we ghouls don't take too kindly to unpaying solicitors."

With the waitress making it clear that she had more important matters to deal with, Hide, with a guilty conscience still on his mind from when he had accidentally caused Oohashi to be embarrassed in front of her customers, decided to try and redeem himself at that very moment. "Actually, my friend and I were looking for a nice place to sit down and have a good meal downtown… Originally, we were going to check out this place called 'Uzumaki Noodle House', but considering that we're here and my friend's not his usual self when he's hungry…"

Surprised that Hide was trying to imply that he wanted to eat at her cafe after she had threatened them with bodily harm for causing a scene in the first place, the waitress became wide-eyed and her eyes returned to their usual blue-self as she stared back at him with a confused look crossing her face. "… Oh, yes… I think I heard about that place, but… You two are aware that you aren't anywhere near downtown, right?"

"W-We aren't?" Kaneki finally spoke up, after finding the revelation to be nothing short of a surprise.

Shaking her head, the young woman took a few steps past the two young men before pointing a finger out toward the direction of where the street was going. "Take a look," she instructed, and waited for Hide and Kaneki to look over to where she was pointing, and were met with the sight of slightly decrypted buildings that looked like they hadn't been renovated in over eight years. "See how close we are to that big brick wall just over the horizon? Yeah, you're uptown, not downtown: it's where ghouls can afford to live."

"W-Why's that?" Kaneki asked with curiosity and worry in his voice, due to him feeling like he wasn't going to like the question that he felt obligated to ask.

Looking at him like he was stupid, the waitress was about to make a sarcastic remark about how oblivious Kaneki was, but held back her tongue and instead just explained it him like she would to a human. "It's not just here, it's anywhere near there's a wall. Think of it like this, the reason why real estate is so cheap when you're this close to the wall, is because if there's a breach in security and some dragon or whatever comes in before they have time to patch it up, guess who's getting picked off first?" The young woman asked rhetorically while pointing a thumb back at herself.

"They, the uh… TSC. They do it on purpose, and I get why," the waitress continued with a growing worried look on her face, as the thought of how things were going in the cafe without her weighed heavily on her mind. "We ghouls can handle ourselves if we have to defend ourselves from a dragon orphan, or even whatever else the 'wasteland' has to throw at us. Humans though? Not so much; not without a weapon, of course…" She trailed off, before glancing over to Hide with a slightly smug look on her youthful face. "No offense, but you humans aren't exactly the most capable bunch."

"None taken," Hide said casually with a half-cocked smile, as he slowly put his hands back into the pockets of his denim jacket. "So, uh… Are we cool then? Sorry about any transgressions, ma'am; didn't mean to start anything back there," Hide asked as casually as he could, all while trying to squeeze out an answer in regards to their standing with the ghoul before them.

Taking a few moments to digest the apology and question given to her by Hide, the indigo-haired woman thought about what to say before slowly lowering her guard and allowing herself to smile as she let out a quiet sigh. "Of course, and… My apologies for the way I reacted, it's just… Around these parts, a ghoul's gotta stand her ground," she explained with a shrug, before slowly turning around to begin making her way to the front door with the two young men following behind her.

"… Granted, territory wars aren't really a thing anymore, or so I've been told. At least here within the walls, they aren't," she said, as she held the door open for her two customers before closing it behind her, in order to keep the warm air of her air conditioner from leaving the confines of her very cozy coffee shop diner. "With the way the world is, we ghouls gotta stick together so… Things never really escalate, other than maybe a few punches here and there at most," she explained, while leading Kaneki and Hide to their own booth, before handing them both two menus and napkins with silverware inside of them.

"Stick around these parts, and you'll learn a whole lot more than you ever will in those fancy schools that humans often take for granted," the young waitress said with bit of resentment and pride in her voice, as she whipped out her notepad and a pencil from her apron before proceeding to ask, "Now, what can I start you two off with?"

Being the quicker reader between him and his best friend, Kaneki had already looked over the available beverages offered at the coffee shop, even before Hide had a chance to lift his menu from the table. "If it's okay ma'am, I'll have a cappuccino with a few pumps of caramel creamer, please."

Giving Kaneki a raised brow, as if she thought he was joking with her, it took the waitress a moment to remember what Hide had said about his transition being very recent; far more recent than she had already assumed it to be. "Sorry to break it to you, but creamer isn't really an option for you anymore…" The waitress pointed out with a slightly empathetic look on her face, as she nodded over to the black armband that labeled Kaneki for what he actually was now.

"Oh… Oh, you're… You're right, aren't you?" Kaneki replied back with disappointment in his voice, as he tried to not look too upset over no longer being able to have something that the ghoul standing over him never got to try in the first place. "I, uh… I can still have coffee, right? I think I read that somewhere online…"

Letting out an amused chuckle, the woman shook her head to herself while writing down Kaneki's order. "While I would advise you to not believe everything you read online, you'd be correct. As a ghoul, you can drink coffee, water, sparkling water if you're feeling daring, and… That's about it, really. Not unless you're into blood-wine, which is, uh… You know, illegal," the waitress pointed out with a neutral look on her face, showing that she didn't really care about the unusual prohibition act that ghouls had to follow.

"Oh thank God…!" Kaneki whispered under his breath out of relief, as the thought of living the rest of his life without an ounce of the heavily bean juice seemed like a living hell to him. 'Christ, I think that would have been my 'Joker' moment right there if she would have said 'no'…' Kaneki thought dramatically to himself, while the waitress turned her attention over to Hide with a raised eyebrow.

"What about you, human? What can I get you?" The waitress asked with an expectant look on her face, as if she were already anticipating for him to ask if they had anything other than what was written on the menu.

"Can I get uh… Got any cola?" Hide asked, after having searched for any soda within the beverage options below. Judging by the lack of poker face on Hide's nervous expression, the waitress already suspected that he knew the answer to his own question.

"I don't carry that 'Moon-Cola' stuff that they make nowadays… But do I have any bottles of actual Coke? Yes, yes I do," the waitress said with a frown, before lowering her eyelids as she stared back at the human who dared to ask her for what all ghouls sought for. "Am I willing to sell them to you? Not unless you're willing to make me an offer that's above thirteen-thousand yen."

Shocked and utterly disgusted by the amount of money that the waitress had said, Hide let out an offended gasp as he stared bewilderingly back at her unamused expression. "Jesus Christ…! Why the hell are you charging me that much for a soda?! You just said that ghouls can only drink water and coffee, and blood wine?! What's with the high market prices for Coke?!"

"I wasn't misguiding you when I said that ghouls can't have soda, human; that off brand stuff they make in Tokyo has crap that we can't digest," the waitress replied back with a slightly annoyed tone in her voice, before slowly smiling as she began to think about the iced-cold bottles of Coke that she had locked up in her room. "But the real stuff? The Coke-A-Cola products they made before the world went to crap? Oh yeah… That's the real deal right there; literally heaven in a bottle," she said with a slight bit of greed in her face, before shaking her head and regaining her senses. "It's the only way that ghouls can digest anything that's sweet, and because they don't make it anymore, the only way to get it is from scavenging the wasteland for whatever bottles and cans remain."

"Hence why it's so coveted?" Kaneki asked with an understanding look on his face, while also feeling glad that he never liked soda to begin with.

"Precisely," the waitress shot back with a smirk on her face, as if to convey that she was proud of the new ghoul for beginning to learn the first steps of what it meant to live as one. "And don't even bother asking about Pepsi, or any other brands… It all tastes like crap for some reason. Whatever is in Coke makes drinking it for ghouls okay… Makes you wonder what's exactly in it, huh?"

"Hehe, ha, uh… Yeah, I'll say," Kaneki said while chuckling uncomfortably, as he suddenly found himself thinking back to the last time he actually had a coke-a-cola brand beverage. 'Maybe it's like Soylent green or something? Did… Did they put people in that stuff? Ugh, I… I'm really glad that I was never a soda sort of guy,' Kaneki thought to himself, while allowing himself to shudder at the thought of all the times he saw children slurping Coke down like it was water.

And while the waitress and his best friend were content with themselves, it was Hide's turn to feel inconvenienced with his circumstances. "Ah, that sucks big time…" Hide muttered under his breath, before taking another look at the menu, this time with far less enthusiasm in his brown eyes. "Alright… I guess I'll have an iced coffee; vanilla creamer, if you got any of it here," Hide said with a slight frown across lips, anticipating to be met with more disappointing news.

"Duly noted, human," the waitress replied back while resisting the urge to roll her eyes at Hide, and was beginning to jot down the blond man's order when he suddenly felt the need to speak up.

"Hey, do you usually address your human customers that way?" Hide asked with a bit of annoyance in his voice, as he raised a brow at the waitress while she was still finishing up writing down his order. "That's like if I called you 'ghoul' instead of your name, or even 'ma'am'."

"Well first of all, I'm only seventeen, so I'm way too young to be called 'ma'am'," the waitress said, while making sure to give a glance over to Kaneki, who had addressed her as such earlier. "And secondly, yes, I usually do call humans 'human', because your kind in my experience has a tendency of calling me 'ghoul'; only when they're feeling nice though," the waitress said with her eyebrows furrowed, before finishing her response by adding on, "And that's only the ones who aren't racist. I could take up ten minutes of your time by just telling you SOME of the derogatory names I've heard spoken."

Not being particularly happy about looking forward to being the future victim of bigotry, Kaneki grimaced while letting out a sigh beneath his breath. "That's not right… Also, I'm, uh… I'm sorry about calling you ma'am; if I knew what else to call you, I would have said that instead," Kaneki apologized, to which earned him a satisfied smile from the otherwise hotheaded woman standing at his table-side.

"Don't mention it, and I'll have one my employees come to your table to bring you those drinks before taking your order," the waitress said with her smile growing as she turned around to make her way back to towards the bar counter, where the porthole window with written orders decorating the upper rim of the frame to the kitchen was. But, that wasn't until she came to a momentary stop, before turning her head over her shoulder to stare into Kaneki's confused gaze.

"… My name's Touka Kirishima, by the way," Touka informally introduced herself before letting out a quiet laugh. "Figured that you two deserve to know that, after all the crap that I gave you."

Wanting to introduce himself first before Hide had a chance to take the spotlight like he did earlier at Big Girl Diner, Kaneki quickly fumbled with his words before nearly shouting, "M-My name's Ken Kaneki! It's uh… It's a pleasure to meet you, Kirishima."

Feeling proud of Kaneki for finally speaking up first, Hide smirked slyfully at his smitten best friend before casually saying, "And I'm Hideo Kojima."

"No you're not," Touka retorted with an amused look on her face, before shaking off Hide's sarcasm and staring, "Anyways… Welcome to my newly acquired coffee shop: Anteiku. Feel free to ask for me by name if there's anything you need from us," she said, before giving Kaneki one last smile as she turned forward to begin making her way to the kitchen window to drop their orders off; giving Kaneki a golden opportunity to stare at her swaying hips as she walked away from their booth.

An observation that was made by Hide, who then proceeded to tease his best friend about secretly being a pervert.

I can't write too much in regards to the reviews and interest that this story has been getting, but thank you for reading this far, and especially for the MVP who leaves reviews and ideas for me to read lol.

I hoped you guys enjoyed this chapter. The next chapter will revolve around Haise and Juuzou. Sorry about not adding more to this chapter, but I didn't want to add too many characters at once. Thank you, and I hope you have a great day.