A/N: …ne, nu skriver vi på svenska för omväxlings skull. Någons huvud slår väl alltid knut på sig; inte minst om vår tids härligaste språkförbistringskatalysator , google translate, tillfrågas i saken. (...inte skulle jag väl medvetet få för mig att konstruera helvetessatser?) Om inte annat gör det nog en själv gott att lösa upp dendrit-knutarna litegrann; engelskan snör fast tungroten i svalget på en i längden, om man inte passar sig.

The above sentences make perfect sense to a Swede, but are designed not to make sense for shit if you run them in an automatic translator: have fun. =P *exercise in pointlessness, both writing it and deciphering it*

Jag varken äger eller tjänar ett rött öre på det här: all ära och inkomst åt Kazue Kato och eventuella andra rättighetsinnehavare vars existens gått mig förbi.

It was a beautiful summer's day, and Shiro plain refused to study cooped up in the sweltering dorm room. The breeze on the roof felt nice in his hair, except when it blew into his eyes. Mephisto did have a point; he should cut it, but his exams were the top priority at the moment.

Would you listen to that? Exams were top priority. He certainly had changed.

"Superhuman strength." …yes, he felt a bit smug about it. That was by far the best thing the imprint had brought him. "I can't wait to start that training."

There had come a telegram a couple of days earlier that filled him with both excitement and nervousness. It's a very common mix, but nonetheless annoyingly distractive; even more so when the sender of the telegram should've showed up yesterday. Every now and then Shiro would push his fringe – what fringe? all his hair was the same length – out of the way, squint, and scan the sundrenched streets from his vantage point. A shahrokh familiar not his own had swooped by not long ago, and at the sight of him it had made an excited loop and flown back the same direction.

…suddenly, he wished he had taken the time to cut his hair. A quick one-over with the knife, maybe? On second thought, that probably wouldn't be any improvement.

Shiro was poring over his books and developing stupid complexes over his appearance when the unmistakable smell of amanatto, in the shape of a brown paper bag, landed right in the middle of Differences in efficiency between Biblical verses and Buddhist chants used against possessed objects as opposed to possessed creatures.

"Awful way ta spend a fine day like this", Kasumi's voice sounded from above his head. "Ye takin' the exam fe' Aria, like Shizzy?" Her long sideway fringe tickled his ear as she leaned down to peer over his shoulder.

"That one and all the rest – and you just graduated from the ninja academy?" Shiro raised an eyebrow at the face inches from his. "That roof door screeches like a banshee when it's opened."

"Good thing I didn't take the stairs, then."

Shiro had to run that one over in his head once more. Sure, he used to climb facades, but Kasumi was a-

A badass she-devil with a face that should be that close to his permanently. She smelt like summer flowers and road dust and adventure, and he wouldn't mind eating her instead of the sweets.

"You know, I hear amanatto taste better if you eat it indoors."

"Then I say yer hearin' ain't very good."

"No, it's true", he ensured with a straight face. "You lay them out one by one, sprinkle them with sesame seeds, and eat them off each other's naked bodies. They taste wonderful."

Kasumi's hearty laughter made her voluptuous chest tremble against his back and fill his head with other creative ways of dining.

"Nice try, pretty-boy." She straightened up and ruffled his hair: dammit, he should've had it cut. "Savin' up fer a perm? That an' those glasses an' ye'll look just like an old lady."

"Oh, is that the kind you prefer? Sorry, I didn't know."

"Ohoho, well~", she smirked down at him from above. "Ye're the expert at pickin' out the girls ye can't get, aren't ya? Fe' the record", she leaned down over him to pick the bag up, brushing – laying – her full breasts against his shoulder, "I like my men with big hearts an' big…" Impishness played a merry summer-serenade on her features; "…mouths." To his surprise, she placed a teasing peck on his cheek. "C'mon: we got some catchin' up ta do." Kasumi sashayed off towards the creaky rooftop door, swinging the bag back and forth in her hand. "An' these", she held them up with a wink over her shoulder, "taste best while walkin' in a nice, shadowed park."

"Looking good both up front and behind", he grinned to himself as he gathered up his books while throwing sideways glances at the rear disappearing through the door. "I really hope I can get on Shizu-san's good side again. Hell knows I miss talking to him… and he's got a killer sister I wouldn't mind talking more with, either."

There are perfect days: days that warm blood and body like a constant sugar rush, and in every way assure you that life is a beautiful thing. Shiro and Kasumi chose the walk around the lake, the one where dusk would see the night market setting up shop on the city-side shore. There was nothing there now, only the bright view of the square across the lake and rippling sunlight playing in the shading canopy of birdsong above them.

Demons dwell in darkness and shadow, and days like this their presences were so vague Shiro could barely sense them at all. They were still there, of course. They were always there. But the sun was bright, life was beautiful, and all the flowers of summer were walking next to him with a playful smile and a bag of sweets: on a day like this, Shiro would allow himself the risky luxury of an unshielded heart.

Kasumi was something out of the ordinary. A pocket in time, but a living one. A henro travelling by foot in a time of cars, owning only the treasure of memories in a time where value was counted in money and work. A thousand tales from sky to earth lived in her smiling eyes, and her skin shone proudly with the deep tint of hard-earned wisdom: someone out of the ordinary. Someone who inevitably drew Shiro's attention.

"Nah, enough o' my roadside ramblings", she concluded after a most fascinating story of a man who had not only accidentally severed his toe while thinning his cabbages, but found that it enhanced the flavour of rice wine quite nicely if you let it soak in the bottle. "What've you been up to? When ye're not on hero duty an' savin' women an' children in need?"

"Saving demons in need", he said with a smile, took a bean from the bag and let his hand incidentally brush against Kasumi's. "Oh, you don't believe me? Ask Mephisto's butler. He came to me the other day and begged me on his knees to save the staff from their master: literally on his knees."

Her face was still the image of befuddlement.

"…that's… completely messed up. They come te you when they're having trouble with their boss?"

"Yep: I'm the only one that can do battle with the great Sir Mephisto Pheles. Between you and me, he's one pesky princess to be employed by", Shiro confided with a grin. "I actually pity his servants a bit, so I helped them out."

"How, 'sactly? Come on, I know the smell of a good story!"

"Right, right." He took the unlit cigarette from his lips and tucked it behind his ear to speak freely: "So, as you know, Mephisto dresses like a circus drag queen, and…"

And when he was done relating how the bet came about and how it was won, they had to make a short stop to let Kasumi laugh. That also meant she leaned on him for support, which was very nice indeed.

"Ahahah…haaah… oh my, that's… fufufufu oh ye're a crack-up, both o' ye hahahaha… Oddest couple I ever saw, but it's plain as day ye're just right fer each other", she sniggered, and wiped laughing tears with the back of her hand in a very unladylike manner.

"Oi, you're speaking as if we were dating." Shiro pulled a face that said all about what he thought of that. Thank goodness Mephisto wasn't there to pick up on it. Bloody hell, he'd never let it go…

"Oh?" There it was: the look of an impish little pixie about to pull off a prank. "Ye're down ta callin' each other by first name, if ye haven't noticed. Without honorifics. Will ye be doin' it the Catholic way, or d'ya go with traditional Shinto or Buddhist ceremonies?"

"The one with the fanciest wedding dress, if you let him pick." Shiro made an unarticulated noise that perfectly expressed his feelings about the vision. "The worst thing is he'd probably put one on without even blinking. Half of the clothes in his wardrobe seem to be women's yukatas." Kasumi went down in another laughing fit, so he took his time to simply enjoy: summer warmth and sunny laughter, a cute girl at his side, no demons breathing down his neck… "Well, if you're done, I can inform you we don't really use names with each other at all." He brought a hand up to count. "He calls me 'monkey', 'barbarian', 'philistine', 'plebeian' – I don't even know what that one means, but it's probably an insult educated people use to make the less educated feel even more stupid." He picked another treat out of the bag and tossed it into his mouth whole. "We dropped the honorifics part 'cause we're simply not very formal with each other."

Kasumi's expression was one in between wonder and disbelief.

"Ye must be givin' 'im plenty o' reason ta say that: 'e's been a perfect gentleman the times I've met 'im."

"I have a hard time believing that. Why would he be a gentleman to you…?" Shiro cast a very obvious glance at the bulging chest of her robe; rather than the furtive ones he cast when he pretended to look at some particularly interesting tree.

"Well, at least 'e's looking at my eyes an' not my tits." She gave him a glance in return that could compete with Mephisto's. "Or trees across the walkway."

…he might have to polish his furtiveness.

"You're one scary girl", he grinned sheepishly and scratched his nose. "Too late to say I was just checking that there weren't any pines nearby?"

"Far too late~ Poor excuse, anyway – ye missed that one ova' there."

"Shit. I'd better run, then."

"You'd better." There was a gleam in her eyes that was not to be trusted. "Before I'm done decidin' which end o' ya I'm gonna shove it in."

"I've still got stitches in my leg, you know."

"An' yer legs are longer than mine, so it evens out", she said with a grin that was just the right amount of wicked. "Last one ta the bridge treats the other t'a slice o' watermelon."

Smokers aren't famed for any outstanding stamina: in that department, the imprint had unfortunately not made any improvements. Shiro was an okay sprinter, but the bridge was a bit farther than sprinting distance; and he didn't dare go all out, with Mephisto's ominous words of snapping muscle tendons in mind. Plus he had that half-healed wound in his leg. And the wind blew the wrong direction.

…did excuses make the defeat any less devastating, when his opponent was a girl that barely reached him to the shoulder? No, not really.

"Ah, shit, I'm gonna die…" he wheezed, supported himself with his hands on his knees, and threw glares at the evil pygmy – for real? she wasn't even panting? – that twirled her walking staff idly in one hand.

"Not before ye've bought me my watermelon." She let the staff twirl one full turn around her hand, caught it, and set the end in the ground with a decisive feeling of 'let's go, then'. "With that stamina ye don't need a perm ta be an old lady. Want me te carry ya…?"

Look at that smug face: she probably could carry him, dammit all…

"If I buy a whole watermelon and stuff it into your mouth sideways, will it shut you up?"

"I know a mouth it would fit for sure: how about ye buy one an' we try…?"

Oh, there weren't words for it. There were simply not words for how good the air tasted, how bright the sun was; how much he enjoyed opening his heart and senses to the world, and having someone he didn't have to wear any mask around.

Someone who didn't wear any mask around him. Someone whose laughter didn't ring false with doubts and worries in his ears.

God, it was a whole different life…

They occupied the railing of the wooden bridge across the lake; each with a slice of watermelon in one hand, the other shading their eyes, and both trying to spit the seeds as far as they could.

To Shiro's relief, he could beat her at least at that.

"I'll be!" she whistled when he hit another pink lotus flower. "Shizzy said ye could shoot a yabudemari berry from a flying bird's beak, but I thought that was just fe' guns. Yer marksmanship is outta this world."

Hearing it from Ando-sensei was nice: hearing it from Kasumi was bloody awesome.

"Thanks." He picked another slice from the tray between them, and relished in it far beyond the actual taste. "My ego will be the size of Mephisto's."

"Ye know, I envy him at times", she mused softly. "We've never gone ta school, not me or any o' my sisters: mum an' dad taught us everything on the road. It was always just us, an' the people we met an' left as we walked. In my mind we were always gonna be fam'ly, stay tagether."

She spat another watermelon seed, and attracted the attentions of a rather disappointed duck.

"Years went by, roads ended an' branched off, an' in the end it was just Shizzy an' me. An' then, on 'is fifteenth birthday, 'e told me 'e wanted ta go ta the Academy in True Cross Town." She chuckled in her throat, eyes lost in the dancing sparks on the water. "I knew he'd been up ta somethin', what with savin' all that money – even skippin' a few meals some days, ta save more – but I'd had no idea what 'e was gonna do. An' it really hurt."

She licked the edge of the red flesh before she bit into the last slice of melon.

"The others couldn't help it – we all die one day – but Shizzy left by choice. An' he's my brother. I dunno if ye can relate, but… 'e's like the other half of me", she smiled. Shiro could believe that smile. He'd seen Shizuku and Kasumi together, and they really were... "We're two branches o' the same tree, growin' tagether since birth. An' when 'e said 'e wanted ta part ways, I…"

Part of Shiro wanted to punch Shizuku for putting a look like that on Kasumi's face: but then, she chuckled.

"Ye know how he can shout when 'e's mad. I'm ten years older, an' I shout ten times louder: I bet they could hear our argument ova' te the next village." The green crescent of watermelon skin joined the others on the empty tray. Somewhere in Shiro's gut, a knot tightened. "But in the end, we all choose our own paths. I didn't like letting 'im go, but I respected 'is choice – an' now that I see where his path took 'im, I can tell it was the right choice." That look on her face – no, no; not so soon. Just a little longer, just a little more before they- "I reminded him o' that when I got here yesta'day. It's a bitter pill fe' him ta swallow, but 'e did reconsider." Kasumi swung her legs effortlessly over the railing and landed on the bridge. "So the grounds are stomped an' the cleansing salt's thrown inta the circle: only thing left is for the two o' ye ta meet up an' sort this out", she declared with a bright smile and a wink.

A/N:

Ring the bell: hit the spot, be just what's needed in the situation

Amanatto: azuki beans or other beans that have simmered in syrup and then been coated in sugar, basically.

Yabudemari: in the West more commonly called "snowball bush/tree". They grow red berries in fall.

Sourtoe Cocktail: that bit about chopping a toe off and putting it in your drink? Reality beats fiction. Google it and find out. 8/