"Is this really necessary?"

"Yes."

"Ugh."

Saturday morning brings with it a lockdown on the two occupants of Eyes Rutherford's loft, and Kirie is not happy about it. She understands her companion's reasoning, of course - a Hunter did make a threat on her life, and said Hunter very well could have been the idiot who had already gained access to her apartment, maybe gone through her things while she was away…

… but that doesn't mean she has to be happy, being stuck inside with a moody pianist all weekend.

She's lying sprawled out on the oversized white couch that takes up an entire side of his living room, alternating between using her laptop and watching him scratch notes onto lined paper, and she is bored out of her mind. She's been pretend shopping for his loft for the last hour or so, since the decorating is pretty sparse (and it's nice to pretend she's rich like him), but even that is starting to lose its appeal.

"What do you do on days like this?" she asks, peeking over the top of her screen at him. "You said you've been locked away by bodyguards before, right?"

"Ah." He doesn't look up from his pen and paper. "Even so, I would be doing the same as I am now."

"Writing music?"

"Or practicing, yes."

"You didn't sound like you needed practice at that concert."

He glances at her. "No matter how talented one is at their craft, it is foolish to fall out of practice." He returns his attention to the paper. "Furthermore, I was under the impression that you cared little for the music I played."

"Not that recycled crap." She rolls her eyes. "Maybe something original would be better. But I had to put up with enough Bach and Chopin and whatever in my music classes in school. Just listening to someone else play the same thing over and over again is annoying."

"Perhaps you have just not come to appreciate the sound of the piano."

"I doubt that."

"Then I will make it my mission to convince you otherwise."

"Ha." She closes her laptop and tosses it to the side, sitting up and crossing her legs. "Good luck with that."

He looks up again, this time with one pale eyebrow arched over the top of his dark glasses. "Have I done something to make you angry with me, Kirie?"

The question catches her fully off guard, and she blinks, opens her mouth, stammers, and rubs the back of her neck before even formulating a - rather sheepish - response. "I… guess I'm just taking the… situation… hard. Sorry. It's not really about you… I guess."

"Would you be more comfortable if I was not here?"

"I - ugh. That's not it." She sighs loudly. "Sorry. I feel like an asshole now. You're going out of your way to keep me safe and I've been like this all week."

A smile tugs at the corner of his lips. "It was not my intention to make you feel badly about your behavior. However…"

"You can say it."

He looks at his sheet music, at the piano, then at her again. "... there is no need. I understand that these last several days have been very stressful. And it must be difficult to leave the comforts of your own home to stay with someone who you once viewed as nothing more than a nuisance."

She folds and unfolds the hem of her skirt between her finger and thumb, frowning, feeling more than a little ashamed. It's just like him to read the situation so easily, to know what's going on and causing her frustration. And it really hasn't been fair, the way she's been lashing out at him (even if only in her head). He's been acting like a perfect gentleman and she's been…

"Kirie."

She looks up. "Hm?"

He shakes his head. "I am not upset with you. I am simply more used to a… lack of freedom, I suppose, than you are."

At that she cringes. "I guess I never realized how good I had it, even being a Watcher… eh?"

""Good" is not the word that I would use, but we did live very different lives." He pushes back the piano bench and stands. "And perhaps still do."

"I really thought all this crap…" She gestures with one hand. "... the Hunters, your life being affected by threats, having to worry about being one of the Blade Children… I thought it was somehow all over with. You know? Ayumu-kun fought for that, and he wanted all of you to believe, so…" She smiles a little. "Maybe I got too caught up in it."

"No." He shakes his head, and she watches as he pushes in the wooden bench before coming to sit beside her, the couch cushions sinking gently with his added weight. "Narumi Ayumu wanted all of us to have such hope. That included you. Of that, I am certain."

She looks up at him, wondering briefly when he got so tall. Was it normal for people his age to have growth spurts? Maybe she was just getting shorter. "Did you tell him about the threat?"

"No."

"I wouldn't have, either. And hopefully Kiyotaka doesn't." She worries the hem of her skirt again. "But the thing is… a threat on your life, and now mine, at this point… it all seems so stupid. By now, you've all proven yourselves… what's the point? Who are you even a danger to, now?"

She can feel his gaze on her. "You truly no longer consider yourself a Watcher…?"

"What is there to watch? Who's there to report to?" She snorts. "I decided when Narumi Ayumu decided. As dumb as it felt, that's… the decision I made. To support him." She sighs. "And so that means supporting all of you."

"That is the path you have been following?"

"There hasn't been much I can do, but…" She looks up, meeting his eyes with her own. "... I know I've been kind of a jerk the last couple days - well, longer - but… if you did need me to help with something, or… whatever, I'd do it. That's why I kept meeting with you, after all. It - it's not like I'm Ayumu-kun's servant, or anything - " She sees his lips twitch and she makes a face, abruptly turning away. " - argh, forget it - "

"No, no… I apologize." She hears the trace of a smile in his voice. "I appreciate your explanation."

"It's just - I don't get it, why this is happening now." She crosses her arms. "Why you had someone threaten you for coming back to your home, and then me for… just being around you, I guess. There's nothing to gain."

"My very existence is still a speck in the eye of a few, so to speak," he murmurs. "But I agree that the timing is suspect. Even so…" He pauses before speaking again. "If I can resolve this situation properly…"

"What do you mean by that?"

"Ensuring your safety."

"What about your safety?"

"I believe I already told you that I would not allow a threat to dictate the course of my life." He smiles ever-so-slightly, shaking his head. "But neither will I allow someone like yourself to be put in danger because of my own foolish actions. So if I must remain sheltered in order to keep you safe, as well…"

She wrinkles her nose. "I can take care of myself, you know."

"Under most circumstances, I would be inclined to believe that. However, the threat we are facing now… and what you have told me about this person entering your apartment… I would prefer to be more cautious than usual." He stands abruptly, crossing the living room into the open kitchen, and Kirie watches as he bends to open a small door with a glass front to the left side of the refrigerator. "But for the time being, I do not believe that discussing this topic will allow us to make any progress on it."

She eyes him warily. "So what do you suggest we do instead…?"

He shuts the door and stands up with a dark bottle in one hand. "Would you like a drink?"

"... you're kidding me, right?"

"You are uncomfortable with the current situation. Perhaps this will help you relax."

She stands up, still not sure if he's serious. "It's not even noon yet."

"And neither of us will be driving anywhere."

"... you're not wrong."

"I was given this bottle of wine as a gift after a show in Greece," he says, gesturing to the plum-colored bottle in one hand. "I was told it was very expensive - a vintage merlot. But - " He places it down on the kitchen counter before opening a cabinet, presumably looking for glasses. " - during my time spent in Europe, I came to find that I could not taste any discernable difference between expensive wine and inexpensive wine. So I cannot vouch for its quality."

"You're serious about this?" She crosses the room to meet him, eyebrows arched. "I mean, I know you're legal age by now and all, but I never took you as a drinker. Or a potential one."

He chuckles ever-so-softly. "Some days merit a drink. Or several."

She laughs, caught off guard. "You got that right."

"Have you ever had wine?" he asks, glancing at her as she settles on a barstool by the kitchen island - a location that's already becoming familiar to her, even though he has a perfectly good (and enormous, of course) dining table set to the left side of the kitchen. "I know it is not all too common in Japan."

"Once, I think. When…" She stops and changes her mind on her answer. "Well, a long time ago."

"Then I have all the more reason to share with this with you." He turns to face the kitchen island with the wine in one hand and two glasses in another. "If you would care to join me, that is."

She looks at the bottle, then at him. "Why the hell not," she declares. "It's not like I have anything better to do right now, you know?"

"My thoughts exactly," he says, with a slight smile.

Kirie doesn't mean to open up to Eyes over that bottle of wine. But wine is more potent than she realizes, and they end up splitting the entire thing because why the hell not, and that much alcohol with only a light breakfast in their stomachs seems to increase the effects.

So she does open up. About a lot. About how she came to be a Watcher, about how she came to know Narumi Kiyotaka before that, about how even before that she was a university student whose entire life changed and outlook shifted when she found her long-term boyfriend cheating on her, just days after she'd buried her mother.

Eyes, to his credit, isn't completely silent during all of this. He speaks of his own past - of his mother leading him to the piano at an early age, forcing his fingers and eyes to become nimble and aware of the notes and keys, of her own obsession with music becoming a craft he felt he had no choice but to carry on. He tells stories of his own of his time with the other Blade Children, interacting with Kiyotaka, and of occasions where he'd gone to see his mother's grave - or Kanone Hilbert's - and sat wondering if he would one day join them in the same darkness.

"That's depressing," she says in response to that, which happens to be the last thought he shares before finishing his glass. "I know you and Kanone Hilbert were close, in a strange sort of way, but that…"

He turns the stem of the glass around in his hand, watching a bead of wine trail slowly around the inside. "He was my brother."

"Well, yeah."

"At one time, I considered him the only person I could trust. But he broke that trust, and so…" He places his glass on the marbled top of the kitchen island with a sigh, shifting in place on the barstool across from her. "Trust… is no longer something that comes easily to me. Much in the same way it seems to be difficult for you."

She taps her fingernails along the base of her own glass. "Sounds like we've both had our hearts ripped out by someone along the way. No wonder we're such messes."

It's a dark joke, but there's still the shadow of a smile on Eyes' face in response. "You and I are more alike than I realized, Kirie."

"Maybe so."

"I had not thought so clearly about the Watchers also being little more than pawns in the game - about Mizushiro Yaiba and Narumi Kiyotaka's influence extending so far - but considering it now… the role you played, and how easily it seems you fell into Kiyotaka's hands..."

"Why do we always end up talking about this kind of shit when we're together?" She cups her chin in one hand, rolling her eyes. "We're always going around in circles about it. Can we just agree to never talk about the Blade Children and Watchers and Hunters and all that ever again?"

He raises an eyebrow at her. "That seems… difficult."

"I mean it. What's the point?"

"There was a threat - "

" - made on my life, I get it, whatever. But what's the point in sitting here complaining about it?" She shrugs. "The others are out there living their lives just fine, and here we are holed up in your place acting like everything scares us. Don't get me wrong, I like any excuse to drink at noon, but when it's the only thing I can find to do…"

He leans back to examine her face, as if he's considering her words carefully; after a moment he speaks again, sounding cautious. "It is possible that I… bring up the topic too often."

"Forget "possible" and try "damn certain.""

"I will make an attempt to change that." He bows his head. "And I apologize if doing so has made you uncomfortable."

"It's not that." She shakes her head. "But everything we talked about just proves it… doesn't it? We know - knew, I guess - almost nothing about each other beyond one of us being a Blade Child and the other being a Watcher and, I don't know, you're a famous pianist in your spare time and don't say much to anyone unless you're forced." She snorts. "If you're going to force me to stay here for any period of time, our conversations with each other should probably be friendly. And they should also exist, for that matter."

He looks sheepish. "I understand."

"So can we please try to move past all this Blade Children crap and start talking to each other like human beings?" She gestures at him. "Even if this did begin in a really weird way, I don't think it's too late to change it." She straightens up in her seat, grinning slightly. "And besides, I know all your secrets now, so if you don't agree I'll just take them to the tabloids."

"I am happy to agree," he replies. "But…" He pauses for a moment, his attention fixed elsewhere, before meeting her gaze with his own. "... only on one condition."

"Hmm?" She blinks. "What's that?"

"I would like you to address me by my name."

"Ohhhh." She laughs. "I was wondering when that would come up. Alright - Eyes-kun, then?"

"No." He shakes his head. "Eyes."

"... ergh." She glances away. "You might have to give me a little time to get used to that."

"That is fine." He stands, reaching to retrieve both of their empty glasses - and the finished bottle - and take them to the kitchen sink. "We will both be making changes. But I believe they will all be for the best."

"You're probably right." She crosses her legs with a grin. "Just as long as you don't make me live with you permanently, anyway."

"That," he says, with a smile of his own, "I can assure you, is not part of the plan."