I don't own Tekken, the CIA, or anything else but this story and li'l ol me. Cheryl owns herself. Fear the Spork!!

I'm BEGGING anyone that reads this to review!! If you don't, I don't know whether you like it or I'm just updating this one for no reason at all!

Oh, by the way, the only reason the first five chapters were posted in such rapid succession is because I had nothing better to do all that week. From now on, probably for quite a few months, there won't be that many updates, but please stick with me if you like what's here so far, I promise you won't be disappointed. VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

"Ball?" Cheryl asked Kiley, dazed. "Where does he get all of this money?!"

Kiley shrugged. "I never heard anything about any ball, so don't look at me. And the money issue is part of the reason we're here, so be patient."

"You can dance with me if you want, Kiley!" Paul grinned, oblivious to their side conversation.

"Thanks, Paul, but neither of us have danced in years," she grumbled in response, turning forward in her seat again. Paul smiled and put his arm around her shoulder once again.

"That's okay, neither have I. In fact, I've only been to one dance before. I'm not so sure I remember how." He laughed heartily, making Kiley smile. Kazuya watched them for a moment with a raised eyebrow. He sneered at Paul and stood.

"Foolishness! A ball! What utter idiocy..." his voice trailed off as he mumbled about his father's expenditures, and he stormed out of the room in a huff. Everyone watched him go, flustered by his outburst. Kiley's eyes remained on the violently shaking doors as they shut behind him. What had made him lose his composure just then?

"Hey, Paul, I think he's just a bit jealous," she heard Cheryl snickering from beside her.

"You think so?" Paul chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck. "He did seem kind of irritable when I had my arm around Kiley. Heh-heh..."

Kiley looked over at him, annoyed. Suddenly, as if she had just noticed it, her hand flew up to Paul's on her shoulder and held it in a death grip. Paul stopped laughing and started fighting to win his appendage back. Kiley spoke then rather coldly. "I only let you touch me because it made him stop looking at me. For a while, at least," and then, more quietly, allowing Paul to take his arm back, "he frightens me with that weird stare he's giving me all the time, and the red eye doesn't help my nerve at all. I hope I don't have to see him too often..." she shivered, staring at the door again. Paul looked at the door gravely as well.

"You're fighting in the tournament, Kiley. Of course you'll see him again. You may even have to fight him. I just hope he doesn't overestimate your strength, or he could possibly kill you. Then again," he began to smile darkly, "I hope he hasn't lost any of his strength. I want to beat him at his finest."

"I don't think you have to worry about that," Kiley shifted uncomfortably while she spoke, "he's so powerful he just seems evil. I'm sure he would never allow himself to get weaker. And I think you're insane for wanting to fight that man."

"With hand strength like yours, I don't think you need to worry about him either, Kiley," Paul said, only half joking, "and as quick as you were just now, I think if you hit him in the neck once, he'd be out for a week." Paul laughed nervously now, massaging his hand.

"I doubt it. Kazuya outclasses me by too far for me to take down with even a few quick hits. I'm convinced he's got some awesome skills too, just by looking at him. I haven't been training my entire life like he has, I'm sure." Kiley turned her gaze back to her food, which she picked at indifferently. Already, she had met three contestants that she knew, the instant she saw them, could take her down within a matter of seconds. The only thing she had left going for her was that Paul, Kazuya, and Heihachi weren't aware of how utterly inferior she felt at the moment. She even had the same suspicion about Lei and Marshall, but couldn't tell right away like with the others. Sitting in the dining hall with the complete roster of contestants, now save Heihachi and Kazuya, she couldn't tell a thing, and looking back at Kuma, she realized she had absolutely no idea how she was going to be able to defeat a full-grown grizzly bear. She decided to wait it out and be happy that the agency wasn't requiring her to win.

"Huh," Paul snubbed his nose in the other direction after a moment, "sounds to me almost like you've got a crush on him or something." He looked back at her and grinned impishly. Kiley wasn't amused, and her face flushed with anger. In a sudden fit, she stood and forcefully smashed Paul's head into the plate he swiftly realized, thankfully, was already bare, and walked off, heatedly muttering to herself.

After the pause of watching her march away, Paul, Cheryl, and Marshall exhaled again, and Lei whistled, eyebrows raised. Troubled, they eyed each other, and Marshall was the first to speak.

"She's going to run into him somewhere out there, whether she means to or not."

"Yup." Cheryl watched the still swinging doors with an absent expression.

With nothing to look down at on his plate, having already eaten everything, Paul turned away from the others to hide his own jealousy.

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

Kiley stood on the upper deck of the liner, mulling over what an idiot Paul was. She realized that he was joking, but it was still such an outrageous statement that it had driven her away from them all, disgusted. Kazuya was twice her age, anyway. As a matter of fact, so was Paul, she realized. She decided to keep that in mind for the next time he tried to put the moves on her.

Dusk was ending, and the dark, blue-purple sky was now full of bright, twinkling stars. The clear, cold Tokyo Bay air was perfect for simply gazing up at them, as if one didn't have a care in the world. Truly, Kiley hadn't; before she had been sent on this trip for the tournament, that is. She would hassle Jack for a bonus later.

She leaned far over the rail and rested her chin on her crossed arms, watching the water. She loved the sea.

Suddenly, she heard the sound of faint footsteps behind her, and defensively she whirled around and stood up straight. It was Kazuya Mishima, wearing an amused expression. One of his eyebrows arched high above the other, as if he saw something that entertained him. He was looking at her.

Defiantly, she stared back at him with her brows creased with enmity, awaiting some kind of explanation for this intrusion. For a long moment, she received none. Kiley looked away briefly, back toward the dining hall, and he walked toward her again. Her body tensed, as if she expected him to try and kill her, but she stood motionless.

Instead of attacking her, Kazuya leaned on the rail next to her, again staring toward the water on the horizon. His smirk became wider as he looked sidelong at her from the corner of his eye. She turned back to the water, again perturbed by his presence, but this time, she didn't freeze. He had stared at her often during this day, and she was becoming used to it already, as if he had been there her whole life, watching her.

"'I am no fighter,'" he said sarcastically, his accent thicker than she had heard it before, probably because he was more relaxed, "that is what you say to yourself, here, among many who foolishly believe the same thing. You believe the fact that you're a martial artist and that you actually have something to fight for has nothing to do with the matter. You're all fools." Kiley still stood straight, watching him anxiously, remembering how quickly he had gotten hold of Paul at dinner. But at present there wasn't a table in his way. "I'm not going to mug you, woman, calm down." he said rather harshly after another pause, realizing why her breathing had slowed.

"That doesn't mean I have to trust you."

Kazuya shrugged, grinning coolly. The woman's eyes narrowed, but after a beat, she decided to return to leaning on the handrail, looking away from Kazuya as if he wasn't even there. She heard him shift his weight off of one foot and onto the other, which startled her, but he didn't move any closer to her, and so she relaxed again.

"Are you going to judge me by the things Paul Phoenix has surely told you?" he continued, his grin settling back into the interested smirk that she had seen before. Again, he wasn't looking directly at her. He wasn't even watching her, but he could see her at the apex of his vision. He could see that she wasn't going to respond. His grin faltered, almost expecting a snide remark from the woman, but remained unconcerned. He could do without a challenge for the moment. He knew she would retaliate again any minute. She did amuse him so; he knew she would.

"You were saying? About my being a fool?" she said plaintively, which shocked Kazuya. He turned his head toward her, watching the apathetic look on her face remain stagnant. She really wasn't going to fight his callousness. He then recognized she was merely too engrossed by the ocean to respond harshly.

"Right," he said, still watching her, and after another breath, "it's not just you. It's everyone here. With the exception of my father and myself, that is."

"And what makes you so different?" she faced him again, to his surprise. He noticed an insolent glint in her eye again, which relieved him. He was right about her afterall. She wouldn't put up with his arrogance, and he liked that. It was the same reason he enjoyed his rivalry with Paul. Even though the two had been evenly matched most of their lives, Paul would never stand for Kazuya's ego. However, the fact that Paul had an even bigger ego than his own made it less fun.

"The difference is," Kazuya stopped to chuckle, then rose to lean on one elbow and look at her more directly, "my father and I know exactly what we are. We are driven by the need to fight, and we are aware of that fact. We know we are the strong who oppress the weak with our power. You may not know what that's like, because you don't own a monopolistic corporation, but even so, if you fight in this tournament, you are displaying your power to the world, telling it that you are strong, and that you have the right to dominate it. It's not a large event, but there are many spectators. Even your friend Cheryl will come to realize what you do not."

Kiley listened, and almost laughed at how he missed entirely that she hadn't entered by choice. She continued to face him. They smiled at each other.

"That's right," her smile spread as she thought to go along with his philosophy, "I'm a tyrant."