A/N: Hey all! I'm experimenting with more fixed perspectives right now in my writing style, so I hope it's not an uncomfortable (or very noticeable in a negative way) change. Hope you enjoy. Marcessitia, crazy stalkers are a lot of fun to write for me! That and just unhinged people in general, but I'd be traumatized too, hahahaha. Thank you for your review!

Gin didn't like the way Kinu huddled against Takasugi's side when they started their first walk through of the house. Not only that, but the way he kept her under the thick fabric of his black and gold swirled sleeve. The members of the Kiheitai had taken the lead and they were the first to pass the splintered doorway. Matako sprung into the room, guns drawn, and did a full three sixty. She was followed by the deaf man, and shortly thereafter, Takasugi and Kinu. Gintoki watched as Shinpachi kept his worried frown fixed on the golden red hardwood.

"I can't believe that asshole would try to ambush you like that!" Matako continued, slamming one of the three doors overlooking the garden shut. "I mean, I knew something was wrong with him, he wasn't fooling anyone with those crazy eyes."

"He's getting bolder, Shinsuke." Kawakami was saying, as he crawled back from under the genkan doorway.

Takasugi made a sound, as he dipped out from beneath his haori, leaving it with the girl, and Gintoki cringed as Kinu tightened it around herself. He strolled to the decorative alcove in the wall, and looked over the decorative scroll and vase. As if he would find somebody hiding in the sunflowers.

"Bolder?" Gin echoed, Taking his spot beside the girl. She stared up at him with wide eyes. A victim of Takasugi's no doubt nefarious schemes. Gintoki was gonna fix this. He would get her out of this. Away from that devil smoking his pipe on the step overlooking the garden. Kinu pressed into his side, an innocent, defenseless lump under a blanket of a haori. "When the hell did he start doing this?!" The Yorozuya gave her arm a vigorous rub. She would reboot soon. Once some blood got flowing and the color returned to her face.

"... a customer."

Frowning, Gin looked down at the girl. Her lips were moving, but he could barely hear her. She'd thought he was a customer.

"Your teacher's friend?" He repeated, and she nodded. For a moment, the room was dead silent to allow the man to assume the form of a spirit box and translate. "What? Some creep grabs you at the hostess shop and you didn't tell me?!"

"Dad punched him…" The void whispered back, and he palmed his face. What was wrong with her!? Sure, places like that were crawling with morally questionable assholes, but the women usually kept a firm grip on order. For a flyer girl to be grabbed outside was ridiculous, especially for it to be Kinu.

Last Gintoki checked, people were still leaving offerings at her corner shrine. Looming closer, the one eyed man had the audacity to return to Kinu's side. Expressionless in the face of Gintoki's glare, he reached for the girl, and she easily drifted back to him, gripping his yukata.

"We'll take the upstairs." Takasugi started towards the doorway, and an eternally silent Kinu went along with him. The man gave her a nudge and made a show of unsheathing his sword, and with a nod of solidarity, Kinu produced a little baby blue box cutter. As if they thought they were leaving alone after already getting into so much trouble together. Gintoki had told them. He'd made it clear to both of them, and he didn't understand what was going through Kinu's head.

She knew better.

Gin had never lied to her before! Not about anything that counted. Sure, he'd sneak a few sticks of pocky every now and again when she wasn't looking, he'd even once told her that her goldfish had found a better apartment, instead of the dreaded truth of death. What could have gone so horribly wrong that she'd be sneaking around with Takasugi. Or blatantly hanging off his arm, at this point?

Behind him, he could hear Kagura, bickering with the woman Gintoki was sure Takasugi had been doing something with. She'd been his most vocal, devout follower, practically throwing herself in his face for years. But as the Kinu slipped through the open doorway behind Takasugi, Gintoki was drawn behind them.

He waited until they reached the stairs before he replaced the folding screen and blocked the doorway. On the tips of his toes, he silently moved to the bottom of the stairs, peeking up behind the pair. They had moved quickly, but he could hear them.

"She's talking to him."

Nearly jumping out of his skin, Gintoki suppressed a yelp. Shinpachi was crouched beside the banister.

"Don't do that!" Snapping down at the boy, Gin swiped a hand at him. "Whaddaya think you're doing? You an eavesdropper now?"

"Aren't you doing the same thing, Gin-san?" He slipped around the banister and ventured one step further. With a weighty sigh, the Yorozuya rolled his eyes and started after him. They were in the bedroom, when the pair reached the top. Kinu's door was barely on the rail, but hanging by a threat.

"Really, he just grabbed me." Her soft voice carried through the cracked edges of the doorway. There was a long, low sound, like a deflating balloon. "I was just scared." She said, and Shinpachi frowned up at Gintoki as Takasugi spoke back.

"What was he trying to do?"

"I thought he'd wear my skin like a coat."

She let out the breath of a laugh. A single wispy note. They were just… talking? Kinu was actually using her voice for a change. Softspoken, but full. That and using full sentences instead of only humming. As Gintoki stared down into the brown eyes locked on him, he knew what Shinpachi was thinking.

"He might. If you let him."

Gintoki wanted to see them. Earlier, he'd seen Kinu's black yukata pass by the crack of the door, but she'd disappeared near her closet. Near her bed. Shinpachi was right. She was talking to Takasugi. Why? How had something like this happened?

"Don't look at me, patsuan." Hissing down at the boy, Gintoki thumbed towards the door. "This is only happening cause you couldn't shake a ball down and ask her out! Now look at her!" Grabbing the boy's head he shoved it to the floor to peek through the diamond gap in the door. "She's falling in with the worst kind of crowd, look at that guy! Does that look like the kind of guy you want dating your sister?"

Shinpachi was shaking his head. Vehemently agreeing with Gintoki's sentimentalities. "He's gonna get her killed, look what was happening down there! That thing he cut off was about to get up and run around!" Hissing down at Shinpachi, Gintoki finally released him to get a good look for himself. Nothing interesting.

"Gin-san, that's chickens, not hands…"

"It's not your fault." Kinu's voice was low. "Shinsuke."

It was entirely Takasugi's fault! Everybody knew it! If he had left her alone, none of this would have been happening, and Gintoki was pretty sure of that. If Kinu had to tell him that it wasn't his fault, it definitely was his fault. "Plus, you got him."

He was probably in there, moping for sympathy. Playing the emo card on Gintoki's little sister, because she was in her edgy phase. She'd be back to princess sheets in no time.

"I was aiming for his head." Some aim he had. It was closer to Gintoki's head than that guy's. "But that hipster got in the way."

Kinu made a sound that made Gintoki freeze. She laughed. Shinpachi wasn't even looking at him anymore.

"He thought a few guys at the end of the street was enough security." There was a stint of silence, until Takasugi murmured back. "What, you think I wouldn't off a few hipsters for my Kitten?" The laughter picked back up, spaced with quiet pleas to stop. Murmurs about being caught, with Gintoki just downstairs. Looking to catch them.

For a moment, Gintoki glared at the door, hands balled into fists. Ready to actually catch them. The hallway was silent, though. They were still talking, though Gintoki couldn't hear most of what the one eyed man said, and on some level it was for the best. "You shouldn't stay here alone tonight. We have a job later, but it should be safe enough."

"Hm."

A deep annoyed groan rang back at Kinu. A boo. They were that casual? "My mom can't stay here alone, either. If she stays with Gin-chan and I don't, he'll be upset." Damn right he would! Who else would she be staying with? Shinpachi, maybe, because Otae was a good option. She always helped out other hostesses, Kinu practically qualified. Or Otose.

That was it! That was all of the people Kinu would ever need to stay with! None of them included suspicious old men!

"I can't believe you let this happen!" Gintoki started again, and Shinpachi snapped back at him.

"Me?! You're her big brother! Kinu-san has always been my friend- I couldn't betray her trust like that!

"Betray her trust? Oi, did everything grow in there but a brain? She was throwing herself at you!"

"What? Kinu-san never did anything like that!"

Glaring daggers at the dark haired boy, Gintoki sat up. Shinpachi waited, wide brown eyes fixed on the older man. He wasn't prepared to be scooped forward by his collar.

"What kind of stupid thing did you just say to me?" Shaking the boy, Gintoki lowered himself to his face. Ground the words in as he grit his teeth. "You mean this entire time you had no idea? Not even a little? Not the slightest?"

"Gin-san-" Now on his knees, Shinpachi struggled to break free, but the man was too strong. He was jangled around, head growing dizzier with every hard shake.

"What are you paying attention to?! As a teenage boy, what are you focusing on?! You thought she was sending you special cakes with your name in that cutesy writing every week for nothing?"

"The cakes?" Shinpachi was helpless to resist the ever increasing shake of his collar. "Gin-san-" He tried again. "You and Kagura-chan always ate them before I could see them!"

"What?" Finally, the violent assault halted. Shinpachi hung there, glasses half off his face as Gintoki paled. His mouth went slack. Horror slowly crept into the ravines of his face and he grimaced. "But we told you- we told you it was from her and what she wrote-"

"I thought you were teasing me!"

Stiff with realization, Gintoki gaped down at the boy. What had they done? Shinpachi slapped his hands away. "I thought she sent them for everyone and you were both just joking!"

"What? No!" It was a disaster. Kinu had replaced one short black bowl cut for another! "No, that's- why would you think that!?"

"You're always teasing me!" Shinpachi wasn't wrong. Gintoki hurriedly whispered back.

"She liked you, everybody knew she liked you!"

The boy's jaw dropped and finally, the full terror set over him. The voices beyond the door had never quit. They had been humming along in the background, and now, more than ever, Gintoki's ears pricked up at the sound of his own name.

"You think he's not already pissed? We're pretending he's not here."

Jerking upright, Gintoki gaped down at Shinpachi. They backed away a few steps, already prepared to half tiptoe, half run away.

"How is this done, customarily?" Kinu asked, and the man made a sound.

"I dunno. Act natural?" How was what done?! If Takasugi was in there teaching Kinu weird things, Gintoki was going to break the door down. Well, more than it already had been.

"We don't have to announce it, right?"

"God, no." Takasugi said, but they had already announced it! They'd been announcing it since he'd gotten there! Gintoki inched back up the stairs, ignoring the way Shinpachi was trying to wave him away. Through the diamond crack in the door frame, he could see her, freshly dressed in a black yukata. She'd been changing in there? With him?

Takasugi was sitting on her bed, and she joined him, hands folded in her lap. Kinu's shy demeanor was taken advantage of when the man reached over to glide his hand along hers, but she didn't cry out. He was actually doing it. Doing something. Maybe not getting her killed, but this was far more outrageous. She was nearly a decade younger than them. She'd been a child when Gintoki had met her after the war. A child! "You really expect me to let you stay here after that? You don't have to tag along, just take dinner duty."

"You only want me because it's Takechi-san's night." Kinu clipped back, and Gintoki watched in horror as she was squeezed from behind. Dragged into his old companion's lap.

"That could have been bad." The man said with a sigh. That was when Gintoki pulled back. Shinpachi had held his position halfway down the stairs, head down, and entirely deflated. He was an idiot, but it wasn't his fault.

Though it had taken some time, Kinu's icy composure had returned and crystallized into something harder. Something further than the distance she already maintained between herself and other people. Takasugi had told her that he'd called Ai. It was good that the woman was on her way, but why did he have Ai's phone number?!

"Another businessman." Kagura was saying, hopping onto the tearoom step from the back garden. She took the first torch and smothered it out with the metal snuff. "But if there was another one, why would he come now? Unless Kinu-chan is one of those business man mermaids. The kind that sings, and drowns them when they get too-"

She kept going. Gintoki could see the color draining from Kinu's already pale face, as if she was withering away with every description of how the mermaids did the singing, and how they eat the sailors, or in Kinu's case, business men. There was a word for the type of mermaid. Kagura couldn't remember it. All the while the rest of the torches went out one by one. The three in the tea room had waded through the garden, snuffing lanterns as they went.

Kinu had stood on the edge of the tearoom step watching as her friends combed through the blackening garden, ensuring that there were no men crouching in the bushes.

No hands waiting to grab Kinu and drag her in the dark.

When Takasugi joined his group near the gate, Gintoki made his move. He'd finally left her alone. Gintoki was wondering if he'd have to make his own opening. He sped across the garden, already spying the dark form creeping back up the deck entrance. He wasn't leaving her alone! How was Gintoki supposed to get a real answer out of her if Takasugi was there the entire time? What if he was threatening her into silence!?

Shinpachi hesitated. There was no time to wait for him though. Takasugi had barely made it over to Kinu when Gintoki snagged her from behind.

He turned the girl around, and she stared up at him, brows pinched together. It was instinct to hug her. To squeeze her, and briskly rub at her arm to make sure she wasn't freezing to death. Ignoring the death glare Takasugi shot at Gintoki was a clear decision, though, and the one eyed man was aware.

"What happened Ki?"

Kinu mumbled her way through the events as concisely as she could manage. By the time she finished she was dabbing at the tatami with a towel while Gintoki and Takasugi stood over her. Takasugi was still ignoring him, but Gintoki had backup. He had expected to brave the storm alone, right up until Shinpachi slinked up the steps. He didn't speak to any of them. Instead he had started to gather the shards of broken china scattered across an ornately carved wooden tray. Kinu couldn't say much had happened. Only that The strange man barged in, was acting insane, and tried to grab her. She couldn't even begin to repeat all of the things he had said. Kinu didn't think she remembered half of the things he'd said to her.

"It was… weird stuff…" She concluded, folding the damp towel as she restitution her waste water bucket. She was fortunate that her grandfather's tea set was still in one piece. Gintoki could only imagine how much worse it would have been if it had been broken. But maybe that was what they needed right now.

If Kinu started bawling over a broken cup, Takasugi would no doubt abandon ship. He wouldn't be able to handle a crying girl, let alone, a teenager.

"Be more specific." The one eyed man said, arms folded together inside of his yukata.

"I don't know." Kinu murmured, and Gintoki crouched to her eye level.

"Was it crazy? Like lunatic shouting? Or was he saying stuff like I'm coming back?"

"Oh, he's coming back." Takasugi murmured. His hand poked out of the fabric across his chest, and he drew his pipe to his mouth.

"Because you said you'd sell her to him?" Gintoki muttered, and the one eyed man narrowed his eye. Takasugi was about to say something. Gintoki could see the words bubbling behind the stoney surface of his face, but before he could, Kinu stood. Her palm pressed into the one eyed man's stomach and he acknowledged her with a single look.

"That's not what happened." She stated, and Gintoki watched as her hand slipped behind her back. He knew what Shinpachi was frowning at. They were hardly trying to hide the way Takasugi's fingers slipped through hers.

"Why?" The Yorozuya found a breath of life in the way Shinpachi looked to him. The way the boy's fist settled over his chest in solidarity. "Because he said he didn't? He's a liar, Ki."

"Onii-chan-"

"Don't Onii-chan me."

The girl's mouth snapped shut, and her brow cinched. "What's wrong with you Ki? He's evil!"

If the girl understood any of the words he had used, she did well hiding it. "And old- he's an old man- what are you thinking?!" She was pouting at Gintoki. Thinking it would get her off the hook, but this had gone too far. If he didn't stop this now, there was no telling where it was going, or how much worse it would get.

"He's a little short, yes?" Kagura said, and Takasugi's green eye narrowed at her. Finally, somebody with some sense. "Isn't he too small, and not muscle-y enough?" The man stood there, as she ventured a step forward and poked his stomach. Though he glared down at the redhead, she strolled around him and Kinu; blue eyes sweeping over them.

For the first time, Kinu's mouth curved. She looked back at Takasugi, clearly amused when she saw his irritation.

"That, too!" Gintoki grinned. "And phew, what's that smell? He reeks of smoke!"

"You probably bathed in flat beer and scratch offs." The one eyed man muttered.

"He needs more personal trainer, maybe he'll get really big. Like Arnie Schwartz? Maybe you could upgrade his arm with a gun, too." What kind of suggestions was Kagura making?! That wasn't the problem here! Takasugi didn't need any help being dangerous!

"I think he's cute." Kinu finally said, oblivious to the way Shinpachi was staring at her. She dug the tab off a fresh box of pocky. "And he looked really cool when he took his sword out of the wall…" She was focusing on the wrong things! Shades of pink crept up Kinu's face, and she peeked up at the clearly evil grin shining back at her. Why on earth was she smiling?!

"Yeah? You liked that?" The man asked, and Gintoki cringed as she quickly looked away, nodding. Kagura was the only one that showed no sign of alarm.

"Oi, don't- whatever you're doing, stop!" Gintoki wasn't sure what to call it. He just knew what needed to happen, and that was important. He started to break them apart, but the closer he got the more Kinu squished herself back into the one eyed man, hands clasped at the fabric of his yukata. "She's eighteen." If Gintoki had to spell it out to Takasugi, he would. "It's not only wrong, it's almost illegal!"

"Almost?" Drawing the word out in concern, Takasugi calmly raised his pipe to his mouth. He scooped Kinu into his side and she squeaked. "I guess I'll have to try harder."

Jaw clenched, Gintoki watched as the man dipped down. As if he was going to do something. Kagura stood there with wide, ever watchful blue eyes, her mouth set into a small O. Every ounce of panic she lacked was made up for by Shinpachi and Gintoki. But before Takasugi could commit his crime, his victim gave him a little smack across the chest.

"Shinsuke-" Kinu twisted herself free of his grasp and shot him a look.

"What?" He took a step forward, as if to reclaim the girl, but didn't complete the motion. "He started it!"

No he hadn't! He was going to kill both of them! Jaw clenched, Gintoki stared at the man's back as he started away behind Kinu. Takasugi was being weird, too! Mind reeling, Gintoki watched as the girl rejoined the criminals. She was immediately pulled in by the pink woman, phone out.

"Oi, you coming back with us tonight? Give me your username, let's go on a double date."

"Really?" Scrambling to get her cellphone, Kinu dug through her sleeve. As she was working, the teal haired man came up beside her.

"Kinu-chan, I dare say that you should come tonight. Once people recognize you as one of us, I suspect things like this will lessen, if not completely disappear."

Gintoki glared at Kawakami. It was a cult. They were all doing it! All trying to lure Kinu into their antics! Even that woman, it made no sense! She was in love with Takasugi! Gintoki knew she was! He'd seen it with his own eyes, multiple times, why was she alright with Kinu?

Unless they were more morally bankrupt than Gintoki had originally suspected. If that woman was in on it, it all made sense. They were swingers.

"Hm." They were all trying to hook her. That explained everything. It was peer pressure. Kinu had been too delicate. She hadn't been able to tell them no. And now look where she was!

"Then the next one." Kawakami stated, and the girl nodded. "For now, we need to sort this out. I assume you're staying for this?" The question was directed at Gintoki.

"Of course I am." He said, shoving his hands into his pockets.