A/N: Yeah, yeah, the ending was sort of ambiguous... I felt like adding it in there though, I intend on picking up the pace though with this, things will start to get messy soon... not too soon but soon enough, I have a few things to work out first.

Chapter 7: Letters

"Yamashita! I've get a peculiar case here, can you come to the back for a second and help me analyze something!" The call resounded into the main room of the persocom store, the young woman at the counter looked quickly back.

"I-I'll be there in a second!" She answered, double-checking to make sure no customers were being left unattended amongst the rows of persocoms. With a nod of satisfaction she went into the darkened back room, a persocom lie on the table with a few cords sticking from it's ear port. It was a male type persocom, wavy blonde colored hair fell back from his androgynous face, piqued by a look of sleeping serenity.

A hand motioned from around the brightly-lit monitor, the puzzled face behind it tinted blue from the screens glow. "Come take a look at this," a gruff voice said, "I can't make heads or tails of this diagnostic."

Tokimi crossed over, peering over the man's shoulder her eyes skimmed across the screen over the diagnostics check. "Ah... I'm not sure what is wrong either." She lied through her teeth, she knew exactly why he was having troubles after all she'd written the program herself. "What seems to be wrong with him Reiji?"

He turned slightly in the chair, "A woman came in early this morning, said she'd just purchased this particular com off an online retailer. When she got it home she started it up and it died within a minute, after that she said it wouldn't run again. I wanted to run a check on the specs but I got some weird encryption. I'm going to do some searching, I think she picked up someone's failed attempt at a custom job." He stood and sighed, "I'll call her up and tell her the bad news, see if she still wants to pick it up or just scrap it. What a waste."

Tokimi stared at the persocom on the table, it had been a week since she'd found the name of the owner of one of the chobits, now she had a second one, right before her. The gods had dropped him right into her lap. She wasn't entirely what she'd expected, but it was definitely Genji's handiwork. A wave of sadness washed over her but she remained composed. "Reiji?" She called, heading back towards the main area she noticed him still on the phone and waited.

Hanging up he jotted something down on a small notebook, "She said she's going to come and pick him up around closing... Ahhhh, I don't want to stay late tonight I have a date." He groaned.

"Then... let me stay and wait, I don't mind at all." Tokimi said with a smile.

Reiji quickly turned to face her, "Really! You don't know how much I appreciate it Yamashita! If you ever need a favor or someone to fill in for you some day just remember I'm in your debt."

She laughed somewhat nervously, "Please, it really is no big deal. Besides... I'd like to have a word with the owner anyways."

Hikaru sighed, flopping backwards onto his futon in frustration. In one hand he held a slightly creased letter, it's envelope lying a few inches away. For the past week things like this had been going on, first just occurrences that seemed peculiar, two days ago the first letter had come, last night he got the enigmatic e-mail, and now a second letter. The first was simple, it was written anonymously and had some garbage about looking out the window and being pursued. Honestly, it had just seemed like some stupid joke until the e-mail came all that were enclosed were a series of file attachments with pictures that had been taken right outside his house, all of the same black car parked in front of the building in the same spot every day. He'd immediately gone to look but there was no car, there hadn't been a car this afternoon either. He didn't know whether to be frightened or relieved but he honestly couldn't recall if the mysterious car had been there or not, he hadn't paid enough attention.

But this letter... was something else entirely. It was obviously written by a different source than the first one, this time the letter was one requesting his company to discuss personal matters regarding his persocom. The author said to meet him or her tomorrow at 1pm at the Duklyon Cafe and that time was of the essence. He frowned as he lifted and read through the summons a second time, dismay echoed deep within his ashen eyes and he was soon scowling at the letter. "What the hell is going on!" He yelled to no one in particular.

His mind was a garbled mess, he thought about Kin and what her place in all this was, he thought about the letters, the e-mail, and what he was going to do about tomorrow. If he went maybe all his questions about the circumstances would be answered, but if he went it could also mean he'd be putting himself or Kin in danger. Then again, not going could prove to be just as troublesome. Hikaru groaned, he rolled over and slammed his fist on the floor, "It just isn't fair!"

"Hikaru?"

His head whipped up, features softening instantly. Kin stood watching him as she clutched the doorframe, her face sad, eyes two great mirrors of worry. She was clothed in a dark green dress that puffed out around her knees with thick straps and matching arm-bands, it was a piece of clothing the two of them had chosen a week ago on their shopping endeavor. Hikaru looked away, trying to hide his face behind a curtain of auburn hair, "I'm sorry Kin, I didn't see you there." He wished so badly she hadn't seen him like that, the last thing he wanted to do was worry her. "Do you need something?"

She stopped forward, shaking her head, "No, I came to tell you that it is time that both of us should be leaving for work." Her gentle blue eyes regarded him slowly as he looked up with her.

"I completely forgot..." He said with a sigh, scolding himself for becoming so careless. "Please wait for me, I'll just be another minute."

Kin nodded, "Of course."

When he'd gone job hunting, she'd insisted on coming along and finding a job herself, she said she wanted to 'earn her keep'. As if she needed to! Having her around was so much help she'd far exceeded any dollar amount that could be placed upon her. Hell the companionship alone was worth her weight in gold. Although the job opportunities had been sparse, Kin had searched up a number in the area. Hikaru had taken a job at a music store, in addition to cds and other more defunct music media the store sold components and packages to enable persocoms to play or store music files and they even did to occasional upgrade on older models that didn't come equipped with the feature. As for Kin, she'd gotten a job at a small boutique only two blocks away from their home and she seemed to enjoy it. The first few days she'd volunteered to model some clothing but she mostly helped with the register and took inventory.

Hikaru soon joined Kin and they turned off down the street. Kin still seemed worried, but watching Hikaru's more pleasant demeanor seemed to effectively lighten her mood, he smiled and hoped that her attention would perturbed while she worked. He hoped it would stifle his own unpleasant feeling as well. But he realized that he was keeping an unusually watchful eye today. It didn't take long to reach the storefront, he looked up at the large bright sign that read 'Firefly's Palace'. "Have a good day at work." Something grabbed his attention in the corner of his eye, a black car parked out in front of the store, he drew a shallow breath and faintly heard Kin's reply.

She was turning into the store already, "Wait." He grabbed her arm and wrapped her quickly in a tight hug. Her eyes fluttered in confusion for a moment before he released her and stepped back.

There was a short silence as she stared at him in puzzlement, "Why did you just hug me?"

"I..." He glanced back at the car, "I'm not sure... something just told me that I needed to, that's all." He locked his eyes onto the ground, "Ah, sorry. I'm holding you up. I'll be here to pick you up at eight." We waved and weaved quickly away through the crowd.

Kin watched him go, slowly she smiled unsure of what had just happened. The black car crawled away down the street.

"What good is it going to do, we should be taking real action." Dita grumbled, leaning back against the small concrete shelter that enclosed the stairs leading from the roof down into the building.

"We aren't allowed to do anything more, it would compromise not only our objectives but Runiko's as well." Zima said sagely as he stood beside her.

Her eyes burned, "Who gives a shit about that stuck up bitch!" She fumed, moving away and dropping to perch on the buildings edge. It was obvious she was upset and the mention of the ally and rival had just fueled the furnace. Zima had hardly ever heard her upset enough to talk like that.

"We don't have a choice in the matter, whether or not we like it we have a mission to follow. Diverging from it simply goes against our programming." He watched her silently then approached, crouching behind her and drawing her into his arms, "There's no sense in being upset over the situation, you have no control over it and as frustrating as it is... we can only take it in stride and do what is in our power."

Dita looked off into the distance, she was still mad as hell but what he was right, there was nothing she could do. "I guess." She said somberly, not ready to give the heartfelt version of the reply.

Satisfied, Zima gave her shoulders a squeeze and stood, flipping his glasses down onto his nose, "I'll keep a watch on our friends, for now it is the best we can manage."

Runiko watched the blonde woman walking into the persocom store, she'd considered jumping her and taking the woman's place but the risk involved was far too great. Besides, if the woman returned with her persocom it would be a piece of cake to take it from her. Or if the woman returned solo it was a simple matter of taking the com from the store. A self-confident smirk drew across Runiko's thin mouth, she'd show them what it meant to work for the government and she'd prove she was much more valuable than they'd lead themselves to believe.