Just a little note: Thanks, Wolf and Gouki, for telling me about some loser going around flaming everyone. Hey, God or whoever you are, the only thing that's going to worship you is the dog poop on the ground, if you're lucky. Go flame someone who cares.

On another note, I hope everyone else that matters is enjoying this story as always! Until next time!

He looked from one to the other, an angry and stubborn Hayate to the rapidly departing back of his half-sister. He didn't know where his loyalties should lie, so to speak. There was no reason for Hayate to attack Ayane like that, but then again…

He sighed softly before following Ayane out to the living room of his house. Hayate could look after himself. So could Ayane, but… there was something else that was driving him to follow her rather then stay with his best friend.

She had seated herself on the sofa as he softly entered the room, staring out of the window with an unreadable expression on her face. She started and turned around, glaring, as he touched her lightly on the shoulder.

"What do you think you're doing? What are you doing here?!" she spat, jumping to her feet instantaneously, a fierce expression in her eyes.

"I was merely… why does it matter, anyway, considering that this is my house and I am free to go wherever I wish in it?" he retorted, giving up on the sympathy act and defending his reasons. He sighed. I should have just stayed with Hayate. Why do I always make the wrong decisions? Why did I even let her in? Why indeed?

"I will leave you alone as you please, though. It is not my wish to make you angry," he said softly, holding up his hands to show amity, before turning and walking out of the room. It wasn't until he reached the doorway when he heard somebody calling his name.

"Yes?" he asked, surprised that she would even bother responding to him. She didn't usually.

"Thanks. I'm glad someone thinks like you do," she responded softly before turning away to stare out of the window again.

*

If anybody had told her that she would be standing here, staring out of the window and bitching incessantly about Hayate, she would have told them to go to hell on a platter. But here she was.

She was quite surprised that Ryu had followed her, though. She would have thought that he would stay with his best friend, but for some reason he chose to follow her out instead.

Could it be… perhaps? The thought ran through her head, but she quickly and angrily dismissed it. Just because you want love doesn't mean that every guy who sees you will miraculously fall in love with you, Ayane. Not to mention that it's pathetic that you even want love anyway...

"Besides…" she said softly to the window. "It's not as though a super ninja could bring himself to love anybody. What with all the bloodshed and all, he'd be even harder to crack then Hayate. And Hayate mentioned something about him already having a love. There's no hope there. Why am I even bothering with this train of thought? It isn't as though I would want to be loved by him or Hayate…"

She couldn't convince himself. She did want Hayate's love. That smile that he always directed at Kasumi, that friendly one which lost you in his golden-brown eyes, the one that made his entire visage soften. She wanted it directed at her. But it never would be. She was the mistake, the bastard child. Never to be accepted fully into the clan because of her parents' mistake.

Suddenly, a thought struck her. Did Hayabusa have those problems? He didn't say a lot, and hadn't mentioned them, but then again, if he hadn't mentioned something, probably something of the sort had occurred. A few incidents, he had said. With him, that could mean anything.

Forget about Hayate. Forget he even exists. Better to forget and live then remember and get your heart broken.

Yet, she couldn't fully convince herself, no matter how hard she tried. Hayate was the only person she could bring herself to love. Even though love was weakness and all that shit. Loving Hayate was a weakness, a hole in her otherwise impenetrable barrier, or so she liked to think. Perhaps it wasn't as impenetrable as she had thought.